Maggio Musicale plays La Boheme with piano only
UncategorizedMessage from the Florence opera house:
The Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino informs the kind public that, due to the national strike imposed by Trade Union Organizations for the renewal of the National Collective Contract of the Symphony Lyrical Foundations, it is not able – at the moment – to guarantee the regular execution of the first performance of the opera “La bohème” in the program tonight.
The Teatro del Maggio has however decided to raise the curtain on the play that will eventually be proposed with the performance of piano music.
The audience who does not intend to attend the play performed in this mode will be able to ask for a refund of their ticket, or they will be able to move their place to one of the next performances of “La bohème”, commensurate with availability.
C-h-a-o-s.
All the audience members and scabs involved with this embarrassment should be ashamed of themselves.
Makes me want to fire up the best opera movie ever made, Meeting Venus, in which a similar problem is faced — and resolved…
“The Teatro del Maggio has however decided to raise the curtain on the play that will eventually be proposed with the performance of piano music.”
“Eventualmente” in Italian means “possibly”. I suppose at the time the message was posted, they didn’t know whether they would have to resort to piano. I wonder what happened…
So how about a mention of the pianist without whom there would have been no show, full stop? Repetiteurs are used to playing full runthroughs – it’s part of the job – but a nod in their direction from time to time instead of fustigating against the unions would be quite nice.