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© Éric Larrayadieu
Marina Viotti
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September 2025 | ||||||
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Marina Viotti - Recital (Concert)
Andrés Gabetta | Orchestre de l’Opéra Royal
Margravial Opera House Bayreuth
The young French Swiss singer Marina Viotti can already look back on an unusual background and a meteoric rise in her career: at first, she studied the flute, experimented with jazz, Gospel songs and heavy metal and graduated as Master of Philosophy and Literature. Today she is among the most successful mezzo-sopranos of her generation, inspiring public and press alike in the major roles in her vocal category. In addition, she performed at the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in Paris in July 2024.
Carmen, Rosina, Prince Orlofsky and Octavian are among her star roles, but especially the music of the Baroque era is where her heart beats fastest! Together with the violinist Andrés Gabetta and the Orchestre de l’Opéra Royal she has compiled a very personal programme and says farewell for one evening to the grand opera stage: it’s true that Antonio Vivaldi, Nicola Antonio Porpora and Giovanni Porta were among the leading opera composers of their time, but gentle and intimate vocal compositions can also be found in their oeuvres, sometimes in tones of religious fervour, sometimes amorous bliss. Andrés Gabetta sets an instrumental counterpoint with violin compositions such as Pietro Locatelli’s Concerto gross Op.1 or Vivaldi’s bizarre “Grosso Mogul” Concerto.
Program and cast
Marina Viotti - Mezzo-soprano
Andrés Gabetta - Conductor and Violin
Orchestre de l’Opéra Royal
PROGRAMME
Henry Purcell (1659–1695)
The curtain tune
from Timon of Athens
Giovanni Porta (1675–1755)
Volate gentes, venite cum spe
Motet for Solo Voice, Strings and Basso continuo
Antonio Vivaldi (1678–1741)
Violin Concerto in D Major “Grosso Mogul” RV 208
Allegro
Nicola Antonio Porpora (1686–1768)
Salve Regina in F Major
INTERMISSION
Pietro Locatelli (1695–1764)
Concerto grosso Op. 1/11
Largo
Antonio Vivaldi
“O servi volate”
Aria from the Oratorio Juditha triumphans RV 644
Ascende læta RV 635
Motet for Solo Voice, Two Violins, Viola and Basso continuo
Violin Concerto in B Minor “Per Signora Anna Maria” RV 387
Allegro – Largo – Allegro
Canta in prato, ride in monte RV 636
Cantata for Solo Voice, Strings and Basso continuo
“Armatae face et anguibus”
Aria from the Oratorio Juditha triumphans RV 644
Margravial Opera House
It was built according to plans designed by the French architect Joseph Saint-Pierre (ca. 1709 – 1754), court builder of the Hohenzollern margrave Frederick of Brandenburg-Bayreuth and his wife Princess Wilhelmine of Prussia. It was inaugurated on the occasion of the marriage of their daughter Elisabeth Fredericka Sophie with Duke Charles Eugene of Württemberg.
The wooden interior was designed by Giuseppe Galli Bibiena (1696 – 1757) and his son Carlo from Bologna in an Italian Late Baroque style. The box theatre is completely preserved in its original condition, except for the curtain which was taken by Napoleon's troops on their march to the 1812 Russian campaign. The prince box was seldom used by the art-minded margravial couple, who preferred a front-row seat.
Princess Wilhelmine, older sister of the Prussian king Frederick the Great, had established the margravial theatre company in 1737. In the new opera house she participated as a composer of opera works and Singspiele, as well as an actor and director. Today she features in a sound-and-light presentation for tourists. After her death in 1758, performances ceased and the building went into disuse, one reason for its good conservation status.
More than one hundred years later, the stage's great depth of 27 metres (89 ft) attracted the composer Richard Wagner, who in 1872 chose Bayreuth as festival centre and had the Festspielhaus built north of the town. The foundation stone ceremony was held on 22 May, Wagner's birthday, and included a performance of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9, directed by the maestro.
Parts of the 1994 biopic Farinelli were filmed in the Opera House. The theatre was the site of the annual Bayreuther Osterfestival until 2009. Each September from the year 2000 to 2009, the theatre also hosted the Bayreuth Baroque festival, with performances of early operatic rarities. The 2009 festival included performances of Andrea Bernasconi's festa teatrale, L'Huomo, to a libretto by the Margravine Wilhelmine.
The theatre closed between October 2012 for extensive refurbishment and redevelopment and reopened 12 April 2018.
© Éric Larrayadieu
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