SUOR ANGELICA

CO-PRODUCTION OF THE MADLENIANUM AND ROSSI FEST

PREMIERE OF THE OPERA SUOR ANGELICA BY GIACOMO PUCCINI

 

The finale of the fourth edition of the summer opera academy Rossi Fest, takin place from 20th to 27th September, will feature the premiere of the opera Suor Angelica, to mark 100 years of the death of Giacomo Puccini and in the second part, whereas the second part will present a Gala concert with the participation of the Brothers Baruh choir, celebrating the choir's 145th anniversary and within the European Days of Jewish Culture. The program will be held on Friday, 27th September at 19:30 on the Large Stage of Madlenianum. The opera will be conducted by Stefan Zekic and directed by Ana Grigorovic, while the concert will feature a guest conductor from Israel, Adi Bar Soria. The opera Suor Angelica was last revived at the National Theatre in 2016 and is usually performed by students of the Faculty of Music Arts (FMU).

Suor Angelica is the second part of Giacomo Puccini's Triptych, which also includes the operas Il Tabarro and Gianni Schicchi. This work is based on the libretto by Giovacchino Forzano about a nun who takes her own life after hearing that her child has died. While composing the score, Puccini sought assistance from his sister Iginia, who was the abbess of a convent in Vicopelago, known as Sister Giulia Enrichetta. She allowed him to visit the convent and play the score for the gathered nuns, who, according to testimony, were "moved to tears." The premiere of Suor Angelica took place on 14 December 1918, at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, where the Triptych was performed in its entirety.

A late 17th-century convent. The sisters sing hymns, and the abbess reprimands those who are late as they all gather in the convent garden. The head nun tells a story that this evening marks the first of three nights during which miracles happen every year when the setting sun illuminates their fountain, turning the water golden. The nuns talk about their wishes. While the other sisters openly express their desires, Sister Angelica claims she has none. This, of course, is not true, as everyone knows that, despite having come to the monastery as punishment, Angelica dreams of hearing from her wealthy, noble family after seven years of waiting in vain. The nurse sister asks Angelica to prepare a herbal remedy for a nun who has been stung by a wasp. Soon, word spreads that a grand carriage has arrived at the convent gates. This upsets Sister Angelica, as she is convinced that someone from her family has come at last. The head nun calms Angelica and announces that the unexpected visitor is the Princess, Angelica’s aunt. The reason for her visit is to persuade Angelica to renounce her inheritance in favour of her sister, who is getting married. It is also revealed that Angelica is in the convent to atone for a grievous sin— having had an illegitimate child whom she cannot forget and who was forcibly taken from her. A new, painful blow strikes Angelica when the princess tells her that her son has died. Angelica signs the documents, remains alone, and, grieving for her son's death, mourns through the painful aria "Senza Mamma." Angelica, in her delirium, believes she sees her son, hears his cries, and feels his call to join him in heaven. She prepares and drinks a poisonous potion, only to realize that by choosing suicide as the solution, she has committed a mortal sin and will be condemned to eternal separation from her son. With her last strength, she prays to the Virgin Mary and experiences the miracle of her mercy as her child runs into her arms.

Rossi Fest is an international music festival inspired by the work of the distinguished European composer of an extraordinary life and creative legacy, Salamone Rossi (1570-1650). Given the historical context in which Rossi composed, his body of work is unique for its synthesis of East and West, combining late Renaissance/early Baroque music from Western Europe with traditional Jewish and synagogue texts. The festival draws its inspiration from the very nature of Rossi's work, which promotes the appreciation of diverse cultural heritages and fosters cultural dialogue through their unusual blends at a high artistic level, which are precisely the values Rossi Fest seeks to promote.

The vision of Rossi Fest is to establish itself as one of the most significant music festivals in Europe through continuous and long-term development, and for the festival to become an international symbol for the promotion, exploration, and creation of cultural dialogue as well as Jewish tradition in music. The festival is envisioned as an innovative, dynamic, multicultural, and thematically unique musical event in Europe, with an inherent passion for learning and providing the essential foundation for new artistic achievements and intercultural dialogue, as the festival’s core, represents an inexhaustible source for exploring classical music, but also for creating new musical works, and is one of the fundamental values upheld by the European community. Given the theme and the very structure of the festival program, the organizers aim for Rossi Fest to become one of the future leaders of Belgrade’s cultural events.

The founder and director of Rossi Fest is a conductor Stefan Zekic. He has studied conducting and solo singing at the Faculty of Music Arts in Belgrade, where he is currently pursuing doctoral studies in opera conducting. He has honed his skills through seminars and masterclasses led by renowned conductors such as Uros Lajovic (Austria), Andrew Parrott (UK), and Max Frey (Germany). Since 2006, Zekic has been the chief conductor of the Brothers Baruh Choir, founded in 1879. He is also the founder and artistic director of the early music ensemble Canticum Novum and the conductor of the Jewish Chamber Orchestra.

Since the 2009/10 season, he has been engaged with the National Theatre in Belgrade, where he made his debut with Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro, and in 2014, he became the conductor of the Opera Studio, with which he premiered two Mozart productions: The Magic Flute and Bastien and Bastienne. As a guest conductor, Zekic has delivered notable performances with various ensembles, including the Madrigal Choir of the Faculty of Music Arts, the Faculty of Music Arts Symphony Orchestra, the vocal ensembles Oktoih, Marienhain (Germany), and Musica (Slovenia), as well as the Royal Strings of St. George, the Jewish Chamber Orchestra, the Stanislav Binički Symphony Orchestra, and the Montenegrin Symphony Orchestra. He has received numerous awards at the most prestigious international choral music festivals, as well as a special distinction from the State of Israel for his outstanding achievements in Jewish music. Among the prominent artists he has collaborated with are Oscar-winner Jiří Menzel, John Ramster, Martin Evans, Olga Makarina, István Székely, Eraldo Salmieri, Claudia Eder, and others.

Adi Bar Soria, an Israeli conductor and pianist, is the recipient of numerous international awards that have brought him to the stages of prestigious musical centres, including the Leipzig Gewandhaus, the Berlin Philharmonic, and the Alte Oper Frankfurt. He began his career as a resident conductor (Kapellmeister) at the Augsburg Theatre. Later, he worked at the Dresden State Opera (Semperoper) as a resident conductor and deputy music director at the Poznań National Opera. He has conducted productions in opera houses in Mannheim, Warsaw, Craiova, Gdańsk, Kaiserslautern, and others. He has also worked as assistant conductor to Iván Fischer with the Konzerthausorchester Berlin. Some of his critically acclaimed productions include Penderecki’s opera The Black Mask at the National Opera in Warsaw, in collaboration with the composer himself, Verdi's Don Carlo at the Opera Festival in Craiova, and Richard Wagner Gala concert at the Markgräfliches Opernhaus in Bayreuth. The list of operas he has conducted includes Otello, Aida, Rigoletto, Don Carlo, Nabucco, La Traviata, Tosca, La Bohème, Madama Butterfly, Fidelio, Cavalleria Rusticana, Pagliacci, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, and Mozart’s operas from the Da Ponte cycle. Adi Bar Soria has led many ensembles including the Augsburg Philharmonic, the Budapest Symphony orchestra, the National Theater Orchestra Mannheim, the Israel Sinfonietta Beer-Sheva, the Thüringen Philharmonic Gotha-Eisenach, the Orchestra of Grand Theatre of Poznán, the Orchestra Sinfonica di Lecce, the Südwestfalen Philharmonic, the Polish Chamber Philharmonic Orchestra Sopot and the Prague Smetana Philharmonic.

Adi Bar Soria has studied piano, lied interpretation and conducting in Berlin, Jerusalem, Madrid and Frankfurt and has won numerous international music competitions. As a soloist and chamber musician he has given concerts all over the world and made many recordings and radio and television productions including for SWR, DeutschlandRadio Berlin, RSB, ARD, Kol Israel and Israel Culture Channel. He holds guest lectures and conducts masterclasses in universities all over Europe, such as Napoli, Pescara, Cracow and Gdansk.

Adi Bar Soria´s projects for the 2023-2024 season include among others productions of Simon Boccanegra and Tosca at the Opera Festival Brasov and at the Elena Teodorini Opera Festival in Craiova. He will be touring with both productions in Germany. Further projects include concerts in Bayreuth, Bonn (Beethovenhaus), Dresden and Frankfurt.

Ana Grigorovic, a director, completed her primary and secondary music education in piano, music theory, and solo singing at the “Mokranjac” Music School. She has graduated in theatre and radio directing from the Faculty of Dramatic Arts and obtained her master's degree in Art and Media Theory at the Interdisciplinary Studies program at the University of Arts in Belgrade. At the National Theatre in Belgrade, she has directed Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi, At Dawn—the first Serbian opera by Stanislav Binicki, Mozart’s youth opera Bastien and Bastienne, and Federico García Lorca’s play The House of Bernarda Alba. She has revived numerous productions, such as Rossini’s The Italian Girl in Algiers and Cinderella, Puccini’s Il Tabarro, Verdi’s Rigoletto and Nabucco, Umberto Giordano’s Andrea Chénier, Donizetti’s The Elixir of Love and Lucia di Lammermoor, Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, and Bizet’s Carmen.

As an assistant director, she has collaborated with international directors on a number of productions, including Puccini’s Manon Lescaut, Konjovic’s Koštana, Giordano’s Andrea Chénier, Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Verdi’s Otello and The Force of Destiny, Puccini’s Tosca, and Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman.

She has directed plays in various theatres across Serbia: Five Boys by Simona Semenic (Little Theatre "Dusko Radovic"), Fifty Blows by Tamara Barackov and Magic Afternoon by Wolfgang Bauer (Atelier 212); the monodrama Peter and Plato's Feast (Bitef Theatre); the musical Inside Out (Terazije Theatre); Beckett's Play and Zeljko Hubac's Beauty and the Beast (Bora Stankovic Theatre in Vranje); Borislav Pekic's The Birth of a Report (Pirot National Theatre); If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle by Andreea Valean (Sterija National Theatre in Vršac); Escape based on Ionesco’s plays (Vuk Karadzic Cultural Centre); the author’s play To Be (Parobrod Cultural Centre); Milena Bogavac’s North Force, Ferenc Molnár’s The Paul Street Boys, and Goran Markovic’s National Class (Dadov Youth Theatre); Rodrigo García’s After Sun (Student Cultural Centre in Belgrade); Bizet’s opera Carmen (Rossi Fest).

She has won numerous awards, including the "Hugo Klajn" Award for Best Theatre Directing Student in her generation; the "Zoran Ratkovic" Award for Directing; the City of Belgrade Award for Youth Artistic Creation; commendations from the National Theatre for her direction of Gianni Schicchi and At Dawn. Her play Five Boys won the Special Award for New Theatre Tendencies at the TIBA Festival; the play Fifty Blows received a Special Award at the International Small Scenes Festival in Rijeka, and her staging of Gianni Schicchi was honoured with the National Theatre’s Annual Award for Best Performance of the 2016/17 season.