Martina Franca creates the event!La Griselda - Martina Franca

Between 1701 and 1800, the character of Griselda, the shepherdess who became queen, and whose virtue triumphs over the trials that her husband inflicts, inspired many composers.True to its vocation to illustrate the musical heritage of southern Italy, the ITRIA Valle Festival proposed this year, for the Treerian of Creation, the version of the Neapolitan Alessandro Scarlatti in a new critical edition established jointlyBy Luca Della Libera, who specializes in the study of the composer, and the set of Lira di Orfeo, a baroque music orchestra born six years ago which presents itself as "the creative reservoir of the musical imaginationItalian countertenor Raffaele PE ».These are two decades, the version offered by René Jacobs had caused a sensation.Will it be the same for this one?

If one wonders, at the end of an evening when the musical pleasures were not uncommon, it is that the sound rendering of the orchestra has disconcerted more than one spectator.In an interview that appears in the room program, where you can find booklets and analyzes, George Petrou, who directs these representations, evokes the search for authenticity about the current reception of this music.Without a doubt, he says, the sound volumes familiar to the listeners of 1721 were much lower than ours.One can of course wonder how to define them, but is it not to allow today's public to receive the impact of this repertoire?Now, last night, for many of us, this impact was well weakened, because the global perception was that the orchestra sounded "confidential".Was it a bias intended to promote the plateau on the occasion of live broadcast on the radio, whose listeners will have had another sound rendering?

Composed of three acts, the opera is proposed here in two parts, the first linking Act I and the first four scenes of Act II.This option intended to make the Griselda despair scene a nail of the representation somewhat disrupts dramatic clarity, linked to the distribution of places.First the court, where the king repudiated his grayed wife, of commoner origin, at the request of his aristocratic entourage.Then the forest, where Griselda took refuge and where he comes to hunt in the company of the future queen, who meets Griselda and wants to keep her alongside her.This forest is also the place where Griselda must resist the emotional blackmail of the vassal which covets it.Finally again the court: this place of the initial humiliation will be that of the final triumph of the virtuous gracelda.

Staging such a baroque intrigue is surely not a pleasure.If the work on the third act, where the protagonists appear linked to chairs arranged in line, did not really convince us, the treatment of the first two is rather respectful of the booklet and throughout the representation, even if weCan discuss certain options, one can only admire the richness of the work accomplished and the proposals of certain ideas, such as the attack in the forest, which shows the man to be a wolf for the woman.As she explains in the program, Rosetta Cucchi chose to transpose the medieval framework of Boccace, that the adaptation of Apostolo Zeno had preserved, in Sicily of the end of the 19th century, when the legitimacy of the holdersof power, following the birth of the kingdom of Italy, was questioned.This allows him to use the local practice of "wet linen", ancestral method intended to remove female newborns, to make image and represent the disappearance of the first child of Griselda, a girl she believes dead.Will the spectator understand that the woman in black who delighted the baby, when she returns sporadically on stage, is in fact a haunting vision of Griselda?It's not sure.On the other hand, it is clear that female individuality is denied, by the uniform of the following and by the veil which anonymously anonymous, even in the forest, and that poses us that Griselda continues to accept it.

Because this Griselda, judging by the initial attitude of the interpreter, is not the concentrate of submission which defines the character.In the original scenic division, it appears after the public announcement by the king of his repudiation, and we discover it immediately in the whole submission, attitude of which it will only depart from the outcome, refusing to belong to aother man.Here, present even before the king speaks, his frozen immobility betrays a conflict.No doubt was there a painful before, what she undergoes before us is only the culmination, but is this visible stiffness in the character?Text and music helps doubt it.On the other hand, the other characters appeal.Some are added, such as this omnipresent ecclesiastics, vigilant assistant of the dominant class, always ready to register private relations even by delegated violence.Others are revealed in the spontaneity of their feelings, like the young Roberto, in love with Costanza, whose fiery revolt is fighting by his hierarchy of values.Two suicide attempts draw the work towards the dark when, it seems to us, the Costanza-Roberto couple tends towards comedy, with their accents of expression.But let's repeat it, it is interpretation, not betrayal.

In the minimalist but sufficient sets of Tiziano Santi, a large singing sofa acts as a throne.He occupies the center of the scene, and rests on a bed of sand which will be both a reservoir of memories, an ephemeral support for an impossible future and the helpless receptacle of destructive violence.This symbolic aspect is still reinforced by the omnipresence in the background of a large structure wrapped in white linen, receptacle of a Griselda representing the female being imprisoned in the shackles of male power, which will be revealed in the outcome, and byFive other mini plexiglass sculptures of the same symbolic inspiration due to Davide Dall'osso.The forest will be present by the dead branches that the following faithful to Griselda will bring together in a circle to form an enclosure.For the costumes of Claudia Perigotti, apart from Costanza's red dress, which she will have to give up for the uniform imposed on the future queen, it is black and white.The temporal criterion of the 1880s is not strictly followed, but that does not matter because this dive into the oppression exerted by men on women - even with the best intentions - is without time.Discreet, the lights of Pasquale Mari are strengthened or diminished according to the climates and discreetly highlight the protagonists.

To all lord all honor, Raffaele PE, in the role of Gualtiero, very quickly deploys the silky fabric of his well stamped voice and stands out as the star of the distribution.Amplitude and flexibility are known and full and whole;If a few serious is less sound - no indication of the tuning fork used - if in the third act a fleeting delay is immediately caught up, arrogance and sweetness succeed as the character requires.He hardly moves?Inevitably, he seems to lead a detestable game.But vocal seduction acts undoubtedly.His Griselda is Carmela Remigio of which he is no secret that we appreciate the voluntary attitude of leaving the beaten track and daring to go to his limits.Perhaps this role fixes one?Is it, in a scenic division designed for her, the conception of a grayed from the start contracted, full of back-to-reach anger, which gives the voice this brilliance that we perceive as forced, when we would like to hear it sinkSource, in unison with the submission expressed?This initial impression, the success of the pathetic scenes of which the singer has made a specialty will not manage to make her forget.If we add a few little audible, some extreme treble only approached, that is not enough to discredit a moving and courageous incarnation but which does not fill us.

A Francesca Asciotti is the role of the bad Ottone;He covets Griselda for a long time and since she is repudiated he expects her to fall into his arms.As she pushes her romantic statements, he will explore other means: intimidation, threat, blackmail, physical violence, and cynically expose her feelings and her intentions.The singer has sufficient scenic casualness to make credible the character, color and vocal conviction and the means necessary to carve out a great success.We preferred Miriam Albano, who sang Roberto, Costanza's lover, in principle intended to succeed Griselda in the bed of Gualtiero,.Irresistible as soon as she entered a rebellious teenager she will be able to modulate her show according to the affects expressed, with a most remarkable agility and an attractive stamp that she knows how to color.Corrado, the sovereign of the Puglia, the old friend to whom Gualtiero entrusted the custody of the allegedly dead girl who brings her back to him, finds in Krystian Adam a very convincing interpreter, despite a small weakness in a quick vocalise which puts him fleetingly;The voice is well stamped and projected vigorously.In this regard, the scenic space is formidable because there are dead points.Make it the statement and remember that when the singers are in profile their voice starts behind the scenes would undoubtedly be useful.

Remains Costanza, the hidden girl in whom the voice of the blood spoke during her meeting with Griselda.Mariam Battistelli is a very attractive young woman, who can say that she has the physique of the role.But does she have the voice?When he entered we perceive her acidic, and if in slow moments the sensation disappears it revives in the agitated passages, where the velocity is not mirobal.Let us put that this is a still green voice;As for the scenic casualness, it is already acquired.

Georges Petrou, therefore, directs with a loving probity the whole of the lira d'Orfeo, about twenty five musicians.No sink, no search for effect to put your ears full.This discretion, as we have said, sometimes seemed excessively austere, as in others.She did not harm, obviously, to the melodies devolved to the flute, but put the continuo under the bushel.Probably it would be better tasted in a closed theater, as was that of creation.Anyway, the reception reserved for production and interpreters was warm, and the presence, despite the health conditions, of an international audience proves once again that Martina Franca was able to create the event!