Semiramide

Composer: Rossini, Gioachino

Librettist/Text Author: Rossi, Gaetano

Conductor: Zedda, Alberto

Orchestra: Vlaamse Opera Ghent Symphony Orchestra

Chorus: Vlaamse Opera Ghent Chorus

Chorus Master: Pouspourikas, Yannis

Arsace: Hallenberg, Ann

Assur: Wagner, Josef Franz

Azema: Gearhart, Julianne

Idreno: McPherson, Robert

L'Ombra di Nino: Dekeyser, Charles

Mitrane: Santamaria, Eduardo

Oroe: Bakan, Igor

Semiramide: Papatanasiu, Myrto

Set Designer: Lowery, Nigel

Costume Designer: Lowery, Nigel

Lighting Designer: Baumgarten, Lothar

Stage Director: Lowery, Nigel

Television Director: Ricchetti, Matteo

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Venue: Vlaamse Opera Antwerp/Ghent

Playing Time: 03:58:17

Catalogue Number: 33674

UPC: 8007144336745

Synopsis

Semiramide

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The composition of Semiramide took approximately four months, which is an unusually long span for Rossini. The premiere took place on the 3rd of February 1823. The opera's libretto is based on Voltaire's drama Semiramis, written by the French philosopher and scholar in 1748. For some respects a conclusive works, Semiramide contains, like all masterpieces, traditional elements alongside innovative ones.

Rossini accentuated the role of the orchestra, compared to his previous serious operas: the Sinfonia, the longest and most elaborate Rossini ever wrote, immediately suggests Rossini endeavoured to give the instrumental part a more important role yet than usual. At the same time, the bel canto dimension is probably more developed than in any other previous Rossinian serious opera. Indeed even recently, the difficulty of finding interpreters up to tackling Rossini's vocal writing, often prohibitively difficult, has contributed to the few and far between performances of this masterpieces. The role of Semiramide calls for a singer with qualities both of dramatic and coloratura soprano; bel canto agility is, in any case, required of all the main interpreters of this opera. This is a huge opera from all points of view. It summarizes and completes Rossini's serious arc, and is paradigmatic of all that would follow.