“Cease your tears and your prayers,
For tears are prayers are scattered by the wind.”
From Il Palazzo Incantato
Luigi Rossi’s Orfeo was a milestone in the development of 17th-century French opera. While it has been staged multiple times, the same cannot be said for the composer’s first and only other operatic work, Il Palazzo incantato, which premiered in Rome in February 1642. After resurrecting La Finta Pazza, Leonardo García Alarcón brings this production of Rossi’s forgotten opera to Dijon, in collaboration with Fabrice Murgia.
Staging Il Palazzo incantato is a massive undertaking that involves 16 soloists, double and triple choirs of 6 and 12 voices and numerous ballet sequences. The premiere lasted for seven hours. Il Palazzo marks the end of Roman opera. It is based on a libretto by Cardinal Rospigliosi, who would later become Pope Clement IX. It was the first time that Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso – a masterpiece of Italian poetry with a long operatic history – was adapted into opera. With the help of singers, actors, acrobats and dancers, Fabrice Murgia turns this masterpiece into a festive celebration of the genre.
Palazzo Incantato, Azione in musica
With a prologue and three acts
Music – Luigi Rossi
Libretto – Giulio Rospigliosi (future Pope Clement IX) based on Arioste’s Orlando furioso
First performed at the Teatro delle Quattro Fontane Palazzo Barberini in Rome on 22 February 1642
A new production of the Opéra de Dijon
Performed in Italian with French surtitles
Victor Sicard, baritone – Orlando
Arianna Vendittelli, soprano – Angelica
Fabio Trümpy, tenor – Ruggiero
Deanna Breiwick, soprano – Bradamante / Pittura
Mark Milhofer, tenor – Atlante
Lucía Martín-Cartón , soprano – Olympia / Musica
Mariana Flores, soprano – Marfisa / Magia / Doralice
Grigory Soloviov, bass – Gigante / Sacripante / Gradasso
Kacper Szelążek, countertenor – Prasildo / Finardo
André Lacerda, tenor – Alceste
Valerio Contaldo, tenor – Ferrau / Astolfo
Gwendoline Blondeel, soprano – Fiordiligi / Poesia
Alexander Miminoshvili, bass baritone – Mandricardo
Fabrice Murgia, staging
Vincent Lemaire, set
Clara Peluffo Valentini, costumes
Giacinto Caponio, video
Emily Brassier | Giacinto Capanio, lighting
Cappella Mediterranea
Chœur de l’Opéra de Dijon
Chœur de chambre de Namur
Leonardo García Alarcón, musical direction
Ensemble and Artists in residence
RM: Why did you choose to bring this work to life on stage?
LGA: People ought to know about Il Palazzo Incantato since Luigi Rossi’s work occupies such an important position in the history of music – not only Roman or Italian music, but also French opera. In 1646, his Orfeo became the first opera to be commissioned in France. He was an ardent admirer of Claudio Monteverdi and we can find copies of several of Monteverdi’s pieces written in Rossini’s hand. Il Palazzo Incantato was composed in 1642, just a few months before Monteverdi’s Incoronazione di Poppea. From a historical point of view, I thought it was important to draw attention to Rossi and this particular work.
RM: If you had to tell us about the story in just a few words…
LGA: This story is reminiscent of the battle between Tancredi and Clorinda. Atlantes is the guardian of Ruggiero, a Saracen. In order to protect Ruggiero from his love for Bradamante, a Christian lady, Atlantes builds an enchanted palace that will engulf anyone who comes near it. The palace sedates desires. Many love stories and couples are absorbed by the palace, generating several parallel stories. But Atlantes cannot prevent Ruggiero and Bradamante from meeting up. At one point, he even uses his magic to duplicate Ruggiero, who becomes a sort of hologram. Bradamante hears two Ruggieros singing, but cannot tell which is the real one. In a way, this enchanted palace mirrors our lives. We don’t know whether this life is really our life or if we are being dreamt by someone else. Above all, this story shows us that reality, desire and love cannot be stopped, even by a magician as powerful as Atlantes.
RM: Can you briefly tell us about how this new production was developed?
[…] Video plays a very important role in this show. It creates a kind of fourth dimension. Characters are filmed, even when they are inside the palace. We are therefore exposed to an alternate reality that mirrors what is taking place on stage. In other words, the reality on stage is superimposed with another reality, as the characters and action in the palace are continually filmed by two cameramen. It almost becomes a separate set, one where emotions are fuelled by the facial expressions of the singers.
“This almost Pharaonic undertaking remains a crowning achievement. It joins the trilogy of Baroque operas resurrected by the talented Leonardo García Alarcón. After Antonio Draghi’s El Prometeoin 2018 (with a Spanish libretto) and Francesco Sacrati’s La Finta Pazzain 2019, Garcia Alarcon, who is currently in residence in Bourgone with his ensemble Cappella Mediterranea, brings us Palazzo incantato , a work that has not been staged since its premiere in Rome in February 1642 at the Teatro delle Quattro Fontane of Palazzo Barberini. This production also brings to life a dream that the Argentine harpsichordist and conductor has held on to for two decades after stumble upon the manuscript score of this masterpiece in the Vatican Library in 1999.”
Marie-Aude Roux for Le Monde
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“Rossi’s music, which reached new heights with his Orfeo, never ceases to amaze with its inventiveness, the quality of the ensemble numbers, the particularly challenging choral parts, the relative brevity of the arias and, above all, the expressive power of the choral and instrumental ensembles. Leonardo García-Alarcón’s passion for early music continues to grow and renew itself. Here, he directs the irreproachable and fervent Cappella Mediterranea, delivering an interpretation that is melodious and imbued with sensitivity, radiance and absolute conviction, thereby conferring nobility upon Luigi Rossi’s enchanted Palazzo.”
José Pons for Olyrix
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“In Il Palazzo Incantato, Fabrice Murgia displays a deep passion for life and an urgency to create, as if he were presenting this work to the world one last time. The Belgian director – who describes himself as the offspring of Brecht and Spielberg – excels in the art of live video, destabilising our perception of reality. His production is set in the lonely places of contemporary mythology – an airport, hospital, hotel room, visiting room – where the lost souls of Atlante’s palace come to lose themselves. Working closely with Leonardo García Alarcón, he revives the fragments of the opera that have survived the passage of time to release their full dramatic power.”
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