• The Italian conductor will take the helm of this Donizetti opera in February

December 2018

The conductor Riccardo Frizza, Musical Director of the Bergamo Donizetti Festival – in the Italian composer´s city of birth – will return to the podium at the Teatro dell’Opera de Roma in February with one of the composer´s masterpieces, Anna Bolena (performances on the 20th, 22nd, 24th, 26th and 28th February and the 1st March). This is one of the operas which form the so-called Tudor Trilogy in which, alongside Roberto Devereux and Maria Stuarda, Donizetti was inspired by the Tudor period in British history, along with Il Castello di Kenilworth, which was recently revived by the maestro Frizza himself at the aforementioned Donizetti Festival.

The Italian conductor returns to Rome after having conducted Rossini´s L’italiana in Algeri at the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona and Verdi´s I Lombardi alla prima crociata in the ABAO-OLBE season in Bilbao.  In the Italian capital he will be in charge of a double cast, headed by Maria Agresta and Francesca Dotto alternating with Carmela Remigio and Paola Gardina as Boleyn and Seymour respectively. Frizza has previously conducted two Donizetti operas in Rome:,Linda di Chamounix and Maria Stuarda, as well as concerts and other operas.

Upcoming engagements include two Verdi operas: Falstaff at Dallas Opera (USA) and Aida, at the Teatro La Fenice in Venice (Italy)

-The Italian maestro returns to the Liceu and to the ABAO-OLBE season

December 2018
Riccardo Frizza began the season by conducting Rossini’s opera Semiramide at the Teatro La Fenice in Venice to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the composer’s death. He then conducted the opening concert at the Bergamo Donizetti Festival and also the revival of the little-known Donizetti opera Il Castello di Kenilworth, operating in his new role of musical director of the festival. This December he will return to the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona to take the helm of the marvellous bel-canto opera L’italiana in Algeri by Gioachino Rossini, before travelling to Bilbao, in January, to conduct I Lombardi alla prima crociata by Giuseppe Verdi.
In Barcelona Frizza will display his mastery of bel-canto repertoire, on which he is a world-renowned expert, with two casts headed by specialists in the style such as the mezzo-sopranos Varduhi Abrhamyan and Maite Beaumont, the tenors Maxim Mironov and Edgardo Rocha and the bass-baritones Luca Pisaroni and Simón Orfila. This L’italiana in Algeri is a Turin Teatro Regio production, directed by Vittorio Borrelli and conducted, of course, by Riccardo Frizza. Performances will take place on the 13th, 14th, 15th, 17th, 18th, 19th, 21st, 22nd and 23rd December.
On his return to the ABAO-OLBE (Bilbao Association of Friends of the Opera) season, Riccardo Frizza will be conducting a rarely-performed Verdi opera, I Lombardi alla prima crociata, with performances on the 19th, 22nd, 25th and 28th January. This opera will almost complete the Tutto Verdi project, an ABAO-OLBE initiative to revisit every single one of the operas written by the Italian composer (the cycle will wind up with Alzira and Jerusalem). On this occasion the maestro Frizza will be working with the singers José Bros, Ekaterina Metlova and Roberto Tagliavini in the main roles, in a Lamberto Puggelli production for the Parma Teatro Regio.