La traviata

*It is announced that, due to illeness, the soprano Ekaterina Siurina will not be able to perform the role of Violetta Valéry in the performance of La traviata on Sunday 28 and Wednesday 31 July. The role will be performed by the soprano Maria Mudryak.

The second summer 2019 production of the Greek National Opera is Giuseppe Verdi’s highly popular work La Traviata, which will be presented for the first time at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus. The unlucky love of The Lady with the Camellias for Alfredo Germont, conceived and set to music by Giuseppe Verdi through uniquely powerful melodies indelibly etched in the mind and heart, will be revived in a new production conducted by Lukas Karytinos and directed by Konstantinos Rigos.

La Traviata will signal the operatic debut of director, choreographer and director of the Greek National Opera’s Ballet Konstantinos Rigos, who, apart from his choreographies, has throughout his long-standing career successfully directed works ranging from large-scale theatrical performances, such as Bossa Nova, Titanic, The Red Lanterns and Anemos (at the National Theatre) and Romeo and Juliet, to big musical productions, such as Cabaret, Rocky Horror Show, Erotocritus etc

In line with the spirit of Verdi’s enrapturing music, Rigos marks his stamp on a direction that focuses on the “forced pleasure” which seems to suffocate all the protagonists of the story, as well as the smothering effect of economic transactions that defines everything in the lives of the characters. A psychological profile of Violeta Valery, from the dawn of love to the darkness of death, set in a “minimal” baroque environment.  Twenty years after his emblematic choreography on The Lady with the Camelias at the Kalamata International Dance Festival and the Amore Theatre, Konstantinos Rigos meets again “the famous courtesan of the Parisian society” who was involved with Alexandre Dumas fils and about whom he wrote his play, in its operatic version.

The opera describes the love of a courtesan with the son of a prominent Parisian family. The relationship triggers the reaction of the young man’s family, the couple breaks up, and they meet again a while before the girl dies.

La Traviata’s premiere on 6 March at the Teatro La Fenice in Venice is usually reported as one of the greatest failures in the history of opera. “La Traviata was a fiasco, spare yourself from finding an excuse, it’s just how it is”, wrote Verdi on the very next day, on 7 March 1853, to his publisher Tito Ricordi. One and a half century later, Verdi’s masterpiece is considered as one of the most popular works in the repertory presented in hundreds of performances every year in opera houses the world over and with thousands of spectators watching it ecstatically.

For the new great production of La Traviata, the Greek National Opera has ensured renowned Greek and foreign world-class protagonists.

The great Lisette Oropesa, who interprets the title role in the first cast, is one of the most sought-after sopranos across the world. The last years she has carved out a spectacular trajectory in the world’s leading opera houses, while this year she received two of the most prestigious opera awards. After standing ovations in London, Paris and Madrid, Oropesa is currently making her debut at La Scala, Milan, and after her appearance at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus she will interpret La Traviata at the Arena in Verona, the New York Metropolitan Opera and the Teatro Real in Madrid. Moreover in the 2019/20 season, apart from La Traviata she will also interpret Manon at the Metropolitan Opera, Lucia in Munich and Rosina in Paris.

Alfredo in the first cast will be interpreted by Saimir Pirgu, one of the most internationally acclaimed tenors, who has highly successfully rendered the part, among others, in Paris, Vienna, Verona, London, Berlin, New York, San Francisco, Zurich, Hamburg, Florence.

In the role of Giorgio Germont the top Greek baritone Dimitri Platanias, who this year completes a season full of great successes and triumphant reviews at the operas of San Francisco, Munich, Hamburg, London and Madrid.

In the second cast, La Traviata will be interpreted by by soprano Maria Mudryak. The 25-year old Italian naturalized Kazakh has studied at the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatory in Milan and has already formed an important repertoire of numerous Italian operas. She has successfully performed the role of Violetta Valéry in Florence, Genova and Napoli and, despite her young age, she has already interpreted leading roles of the repertoire, such as Mimi and Musetta in La bohème, Norina in Don Pasquale, Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro, Adina in L'elisir d'amore, Liù in Turandot, among others. In the role of Alfredo Alexey Dolgov, whom the Greek audience has recently applauded in Lucia Di Lammermoor, directed by Katie Mitchel. Dolgov enjoys a great  career at European and American opera houses, such as in Moscow, Berlin, Rome, New York, Washington, Huston, Munich, Barcelona, Madrid, Brussels etc. The role of Giorgio Germont in the second cast will be interpreted by the celebrated Greek baritone Tassis Christoyannis, who has also performed it at the Royal Opera House in London, as well as in Brussels, Dusseldorf, Frankfurt, Geneva, Nantes and the Glyndebourne Festival.