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© Salzburger Festspiele / Andreas Kolarik
The Journey to Reims
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 November 2028 | ||||||
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About the Production
IL VIAGGIO A REIMS
On their way to the coronation of Charles X in Reims, a motley group of travellers gets stranded at a provincial spa hotel. Their trouble is our treat, as we are whisked into an amusing parade of characters caught in a web of flirtation and jealousy, enthusiasm and vanity, lofty ideals and eccentric quirks… Rossini composed Il viaggio a Reims for the festivities celebrating the same historical coronation that features in the opera. This extravagant occasional work boasts no fewer than ten demanding lead roles and is Rossini’s first opera composed for Paris. It was also his last in his native language — a late opera buffa that gleefully pokes fun at national stereotypes (the hotel guests hail from all corners of Europe) and self mockingly parodies the conventions of Italian opera. There’s barely a plot to speak of, but Barrie Kosky’s production packs the piece with Feydeauesque wit, verve and erotic slapstick — ingredients that, together with Rossini’s electrifying music, promise a delirium of comedy and madness.
Synopsis
Place: The Golden Lily spa hotel at Plombières-les-Bains in France
Time: 1825
Act 1
Scene 1: Introduction
The housekeeper Maddalena is unhappy with the preparations made by the servants for the arrival of the important people who are travelling to Reims for the coronation of Charles X of France. ("Presto, presto ... su, corraggio") The servants repudiate her assertions. The hotel's doctor, Don Prudenzio, announces that, because of the impending arrivals, the normal business of the spa will be suspended. The spa attendants rejoice and depart. He checks with Antonio that his instructions about the necessary meals for the visitors have been followed.
Madame Cortese, the proprietress of the hotel, appears. She regrets that she will be unable to attend the coronation ("Di vaghi raggi adorno"), but is keen to show off the hotel to the visitors in the hope that they will return some day to take the waters. She particularly requests that everyone should be enthusiastic about each of the travellers' specific interests. Everyone agrees, and she is left alone.
Scene 2: The Countess of Folleville's arrival
The Countess calls for her maid, Modestina, and Madame Cortese goes to search for her. Modestina appears, and the Countess, worried that her clothes have not yet arrived, asks why there has been no reply to a letter that she had sent. Modestina had entrusted the letter to the Countess's cousin, Don Luigino, who immediately arrives to say that the stagecoach which he had hired to carry the boxes had overturned on the way. The Countess faints and Don Luigino calls for help.
Maddalena, Antonio, Don Prudenzio and the servants arrive, together with Baron Trombonok. Don Prudenzio and the Baron argue about how to resuscitate the Countess, but she recovers sufficiently to lament the loss of her garments. ("Partir, o ciel! desio") However, when Modestina appears with a large box containing a beautiful Paris bonnet, she rejoices that it, at least, has been saved from the accident. ("Che miro! Ah! Quel sorpresa!") Everyone is amused by this sudden turn of events, and all except Antonio and the Baron depart.
Scene 3: Sextet
After agreeing with the Baron the arrangements for the party's departure in the evening, Antonio leaves. The Baron cannot help laughing at the Countess's sudden recovery and the insanity of the world in general. He is joined by Don Profondo, Don Alvaro, the Marquise Melibea, Count Libenskof. It is clear that Don Alvaro and the Count are rivals for the Marquise's affections. They are all waiting for the new horses which will be necessary for the continuation of the journey, but Madame Cortese, who now arrives, says that she cannot understand why they have not arrived. Alvaro and Libenskof quarrel, the ladies are alarmed, and the Baron and Don Profondo are amused by the idiocy of lovers. ("Non pavento alcun periglio")
A harp prelude is heard, and the poetess Corinna sings offstage of brotherly love, to everyone's delight. ("Arpa gentil")
Act 2
Scene 1: Lord Sidney's aria
Madame Cortese is still waiting for the return of her servant Gelsomino with news of the horses. Lord Sidney approaches, and she muses on his unwillingness to approach Corinna who, she is sure, reciprocates his love.
Sidney, alone, laments his situation. ("Invan strappar dal core") His mood lifts when girls singing in praise of Corinna enter with flowers, but then he is disturbed by Don Profondo's strange requests for information about the location of antiquities, and departs.
Scene 2: Corinna's duet with the Chevalier Belfiore
Profondo is joined by Corinna and her companion Delia. Corinna asks when the party is to depart, and he and Delia leave Corinna alone while they go to see whether the horses have arrived.
Corinna is joined by the Chevalier, who declares his love. ("Nel suo divin sembiante") She is taken aback and repudiates him. The Chevalier retreats, hoping to try again later, and Corinna returns to her room.
Scene 3: Don Profondo's aria
Don Profondo, who has seen the Chevalier with Corinna, reflects that the Countess will scratch the Chevalier's eyes out if she finds out what he has been doing. He then turns his attention to enumerating the effects of his fellow-travellers (as requested by the Baron), noting that their possessions tend to sum up each of their nations' characteristics. ("Medaglie incomparabili") He looks forward to the impending departure.
The Countess appears, looking for the Chevalier. She is not pleased when Don Profondo tells her that he has been having a poetry lesson. Don Alvaro and Count Libenskof join them, asking about the horses, and the Baron, too, appears, looking woebegone. What has happened? The rest of the travellers arrive, and the Baron produces the courier Zefirino, who is obliged to report that there are no horses to be had anywhere, not even for ready money. There will be no journey to Reims for the coronation!
Scene 4: Grand concerted ensemble for 14 voices
Everyone is horrified. ("Ah! A tal colpo inaspettato") But Madame Cortese appears with a letter from Paris. Don Profondo reads it out: the King will return from Reims in a few days and there will be great festivities. Anyone who was unable to get to Reims will be consoled by an even finer spectacle. The Countess steps forward to invite the entire company to her home in Paris for the celebrations. A stagecoach will convey them there on the following day, but in the meantime a grand banquet, with invitations to the public, will be held at the Golden Lily, paid for with the money that would have been spent at the coronation. Any money left over will be given to the poor.
Act 3
Scene 1: Duet for the Count and the Marquise
When everyone else has left, the Baron tries to reconcile the jealous Count with the Marquise, who has been seen with Don Alvaro. When he departs, the misunderstanding is resolved and harmony is restored. ("D'alma celeste, oh Dio!")
They depart, and the scene changes to the hotel's garden. Antonio and Maddalena ensure that all is prepared for the banquet. The Baron has engaged a travelling company to provide entertainment with singing and dancing.
Scene 2: Finale
After the opening chorus ("L'allegria è un sommo bene"), the Baron introduces a series of short national songs sung by each of the travellers, some of them set to well-known tunes (Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser and God Save the King), and ending with, first, a French song (praising the Duchesse de Berry)[9] sung by the Countess Folleville and the Chevalier Belfiore, then a rustic Tyrolean duet for Madame Cortese and Don Profondo, and finally an improvised solo for Corinna on one of a number of mostly French subjects suggested by each traveller and drawn from an urn. The winning subject turns out, appropriately enough, to be "Charles X, King of France". The opera ends with a chorus ("Viva il diletto augusto regnator" to the tune of the Marche Henri IV).
Program and cast
ossia L’ALBERGO DEL GIGLIO D’ORO
Dramma giocoso in one act (1825)
Libretto by Luigi Balochi, partly based on the novel Corinne, ou L’Italie by Madame de Staël
New production
Cast
Cecilia Bartoli: Corinna
Marina Viotti: Marchesa Melibea
Mélissa Petit: Contessa di Folleville
Tara Erraught: Madama Cortese
Edgardo Rocha: Cavalier Belfiore
Dmitry Korchak: Conte di Libenskof
Ildebrando D’Arcangelo: Lord Sidney
Florian Sempey: Don Profondo
Misha Kiria: Barone di Trombonok
Peter Kellner: Don Alvaro
Giovanni Romeo: Don Prudenzio
Helena Rasker: Maddalena
Rodolphe Briand: Zefirino
Rafał Pawnuk: Antonio
and others
Creative Team
Gianluca Capuano: Conductor
Barrie Kosky: Director
Rufus Didwiszus: Sets
Victoria Behr: Costumes
Franck Evin: Lighting
Christian Arseni: Dramaturgy
Ensembles
Chœur de l’Opéra de Monte-Carlo
Stefano Visconti Chorus Master
Les Musiciens du Prince — Monaco
House for Mozart
When it became clear that the ambitious plans to build a festival stage in Hellbrunn could not be realised, the idea was born of transforming parts of the court stables into a theatre. After a building period lasting only four months a provisional festival hall was built on the grounds of the large winter riding school in 1925 which was opened with Das Salzburger Grosse Welttheater. Only one year later, in 1926, the architect Clemens Holzmeister supervised a first phase of re-building of the inadequate provisional festival hall. Adaptations were again made in 1927 so that operas could be performed: Beethoven’s Fidelio was the first opera to be performed here.
The building was known as the Kleines Festspielhaus, and underwent several more reconstruction phases: in 1937 the auditorium was turned around by 180° which meant that it was necessary to build on a fly tower for the backstage area. In order to make this possible, the then governor of Salzburg, Franz Rehrl, allowed his birthplace in the Toscanini courtyard to be pulled down. Benno von Arent redesigned the festival hall in 1939 and replaced the wooden panelling with stucco work ornamented in gold. The unsatisfactory sight lines and acoustic problems made a further conversion necessary in the years 1962/63. The Salzburg architects Hans Hofmann and Erich Engels gave the hall the form it had until 2004.
For many years the Salzburg Festival had followed plans to create a “House for Mozart” which would in every respect be suitable for the performance of the composer’s stage works, with excellent acoustics and the best possible sight lines from all seats. The auditorium had to be both intimate but also have sufficient seating capacity. The task that seemed like squaring the circle was achieved by the team of architects Holzbauer and Valentiny: what was previously known as the Kleines Festspielhaus was transformed in three building phases from September 2003 into a Haus für Mozart (House for Mozart). The auditorium of the Kleines Festspielhaus was widened, shortened and lowered. Two new audience circles were created which extend on both sides of the hall as far as the stage. This creates the effect that the stage is framed on three sides by people in festive mood rather than by bare walls.
In comparison with the previous situation in the Kleines Festspielhaus the foyers have undergone major changes. Tall windows extending over two floors offer views from the main foyer to the city, and in the evenings the lighted interior of the theatre creates an inviting impression. The main foyer is dominated by a 17-metre high gilded lamella wall; through the openings a profile of Mozart’s head made of Swarovski crystal can be seen. The terrace above the hall construction had never been accessible to the public since its construction in 1924; now, with the new design, it has become part of the interval foyer. The arcade below is made predominantly of glass and means that the auditorium opens out on two sides instead of only one, as was the previous situation. Thus people can step out directly from the festival hall into the magnificent urban surroundings.
The festival lounge on the roof, the SalzburgKulisse, has become a great attraction (made possible by Gerhard Andlinger). The name in itself already suggests the splendid view offered from there to the old town centre of Salzburg. This lounge is furnished with pear-wood panelling; the tapestries in the alcoves are by Anton Kolig, a contemporary of Anton Faistauer.
The Faistauer Foyer has become a jewel of the new house (made possible by Herbert Batliner): the famous frescoes in this hall, which were created by the Salzburg painter Anton Faistauer in 1926, were removed after the Nazis marched into Austria and some of them were deliberately destroyed. Not until 1956 was it possible to re-mount them. For the opening of the Haus für Mozart they were thoroughly restored, and architecturally the foyer has been returned to its original historic design.
As regards the exterior façade the proportions of the Holzmeister ensemble from the years 1924/37 have been retained. The visual impression of the façade is characterised by the prestigious doors opening out onto the terrace which were designed by the sculptor Josef Zenzmaier: he created three bronze reliefs which are mounted above the portals and depict scenes from Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni and Die Zauberflöte. The stone masks by Jakob Adlhart are now clearly visible above the entrance to the house: this is under the new extensive concrete roof decorated in gold leaf. Throughout the entire building rough concrete surfaces are contrasted with fine gold leaf, thus creating aesthetic tension.
From the backstage area a huge iron door opens onto the Toscanini courtyard. The six concrete reliefs mounted to the left and right Genies holding Masks were removed in 1938 but reconstructed again in 1979 by their creator Jakob Adlhart. Above them is an organ which was played for performances of Jedermann when they had to be transferred from the Domplatz to the Festspielhaus due to bad weather.
For the celebrations for Mozart’s 250th birthday in Mozart Year 2006 the Haus für Mozart was opened with the premiere of Le nozze di Figaro (conductor: Nikolaus Harnoncourt, stage director: Claus Guth).
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