Mozart “Le Nozze di Figaro”
March 2022 Grand Hall, Gyeonngi Arts Center Suwon.
Author: Tae-hyung Song – The Korea Economic Daily
“A combination of novel stage and sophisticated music… Conductor Massimo Zanetti shines”.
Gyeonggi-phil MD Massimo Zanetti conducts ‘Marriage of Figaro’in a contemporary minimalist staging, with outstanding acting, a comic and funny cembalo performance, filled with both drama and laughs.
No matter how outstanding the stage, directing, and acting are, it is useless if music, the most important element of the opera, does not support them. Massimo Zanetti, Music Director of the Gyeonggi Philharmonic, showed his talent as an opera specialist. “Figaro’s Marriage” is Zanetti’s favourite opera and a work he wanted to conduct in Korea. With Opera, he’s totally in his element mastering the work.
From the Ouverture, he played it vigorously with his unique flexible gesture, and throughout the performance, which lasted nearly three hours, he led the orchestra confidently without missing a note or a bar. He also had excellent stage dominance and energized the stage by communicating with the actors with clear instructions.
You can’t leave out the performance of Alessandro Praticò, who was in charge of the harpsichord. This work still has the influence of Baroque Opera, so the proportion of the accompaniment of the harpsichord is high. Praticò showed perfect harmony with the actors on stage. He excellently revived the rhythm of Recitativo, who leads the flow of the play.
What’s unfortunate is the title of “Concert Opera.” I visited the show scene because I was impressed with Zanetti’s October 2019 performance of Don Giovanni with the Seoul Opera Company, wondering what it would be like to be married to Figaro. I never expected such a novel and unique stage production. I feel like a “windfall”, but it’s a pity for those who didn’t want to come to the performance because it was presented as an “concert opera”.
This “Figaro’s Marriage” is a more perfect all-dramatic opera performance. The classical performance world needs to define the concept of “concert opera” more clearly and use it carefully so that the audience does not experience confusion over the concept of the performance.”
“Massimo Zanetti is also one of the best opera conductors. He looked happy when he played the opera. He was diligent like a chef who carefully listened to and picked out constantly unfolding stories.
All of this shines even more because it was done with poor acoustic. It would be if the Gyeonggi Art Center reinforced the acoustic through internal reconstruction of the hall.”
”The Gyeonggi art Center is perhaps the least internationally nominated place for Massimo Zanetti to perform opera. In this year alone, he will conduct “Fanciulla del West” and “La Traviata” at the Berlin Staatsoper and work with La Scala theatre.
Today’s opera is purely his virtue and it showed how skilled the orchestra’s chief conductor is. Sharing his experiences with the orchestra is already a great learning experience for the musicians. Personally, it was time for Massimo Zanetti to use this dynamic to conduct the symphony and get hints as to why he showed such breathing. As I listened to “Porgi amor,” I thought I’m breathing in every dramatic moment.
I sat both on the first and second floors and watched the opera twice, and the sound conditions at Gyeonggi art Center were still a difficult one because of the lack of reverberations, it was fatal that the sound was not transmitted properly.
Nevertheless, Massimo Zanetti has pierced all the words of the opera, and even actively enjoyed entering the opera during the recitativo. Rather than showing the opera to the audience, he seemed to want the audience and members to come into the opera. The charming cembalist in addition to the piece music, he brought in the piece the introduction of the Rachmaninov piano concerto, Tchaikovsky nutcracker, Vivaldi, Beethoven, and Brahms, which were really improvised at the right place. on the first day, he put Mozart’s requiem “Lacrimosa”, symphony no. 40 and Beethoven no. 7, and every performance came to mind.
Massimo Zanetti giggles with the musicians at the cembalist performance, showing great chemistry.
How much does Zanetti love this opera? His cat’s name is Figaro, who is waiting for Massimo in Varese.”
Author: Hwang, Jang Won – Naver
“The performance of Mozart’s opera “Figaro’s Marriage” was an opportunity to taste the delicacies of Mozart’s opera in Korea for the first time in a long time, and it was conducted by “Italian Chef” Massimo Zanetti, the music director of the Gyeonggi Philharmonic Orchestra.
In Korea, Zanetti has a strong image as a Symphony conductor but in fact he started his international career as an Opera conductor in Europe’s leading opera stages, such as Berlin Staatsoper and La Scala of Milan. I missed Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” performance in 2019, and only this time I was able to confirm the true side of “Opera Conductor” Zanetti, whose opera conducting skills exceeded expectations. He effectively drew out the flavours inherent to Mozart’s opera by handling it with a careful touch without missing any of the unique materials, and further maximized the beauty of the work by making it all blend in rich vitality and excitement.
As is well known, Mozart Opera is easy and comfortable to listen to, but very difficult to play. The reason is that singers should sing Mozart’s unique transparent and delicate melodies cleanly and yet attractively with sufficient emotions and thoughts, but the orchestra can only fully realize the charm and value of the work when Mozart captures various and detailed ideas engraved in orchestral music. The performance of Gyeonggi Phil, led by Zanetti, stood out from this point of view. Although the overture flowed with a rather strong energy, it immediately came alive and harmonized organically with the singers. Zanetti coordinated the orchestra with a skilful touch to lead and assist the singers, while effectively dealing with the detailed notes of the accompaniment, which can be said to enhance the flavour of the singing, doubling the musical and dramatic beauty of the work. His skills are maximized in leading the second act Ensemble Finale, which is notorious for its complexity, especially at the turning point of the reconstruction’s changing combination, allowing each section to be in sharp contrast to each other.”
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Author: [출처] Bommae/Naver
2022-031 / 피가로의 결혼 – 경기 필하모닉|작성자 봄뫼
Before the show Massimo Zanetti spoke in English about the war between Russia and Ukraine, and that it is not easy to perform on stage so normally, and this work contains all the various emotions of life, such as love, sadness, and pain, but asked to pay attention to the message of forgiveness at the end.
As it is a performance by the Gyeonggi philharmonic, we need to talk about Massimo Zanetti’s conducting and the performance of the Orchestra. Zanetti is actually more famous in Europe for conducting opera than he is for concerts. He has stood on the stage of all Europeans largest opera houses.
Therefor for Zanetti opera is the most confident field, and it was nice to be able to see the true face of Zanetti during the show: he worked on every single note from the nearly three-hour opera and liked the contact with the singers to make the work whatever they wanted. The Gyeonggi Philharmonic sounded neat and stylish. Due to an acoustic problem with the Gyeonggi art Center pit, the microphone was used for the current part to slightly increase the volume of the string, but it was so natural that one couldn’t notice the artificial volume amplification. One thing that was indispensable in music was Alessandro Praticò performance at the cembalo. Praticò, who was also involved in the 2019 Don Giovanni also played a very important role, not only playing the accompaniment of much of the recitativi, but also expressing the sound effects such as knock and his performance was powerful.