Classical 90.5's next opera broadcast, at noon this Saturday, November 28, will be Amleto by Franco Faccio, set to a libretto by Arrigo Boito, which was in turn based on William Shakespeare's play Hamlet. The performance will be sung in Italian and will run approximately three hours.
There have been many successful operatic adaptations of Shakespeare, including such masterworks as Verdi’s Otello and Falstaff. Yet the Bard of Avon's most famous play seemed to elude successful adaptation. For the last ten years, however, Opera Southwest Artistic Director and conductor Anthony Barrese has worked to bring back to life the lost work of the composer Faccio and his better-known librettist Boito.
Originally premiered in 1865 in Genoa and then performed again in 1871 in Milan, Amleto was thought lost for over 135 years. Barrese researched in Italian libraries and the Ricordi archives to recover the work from a microfilm of the composer's autograph. Opera Southwest's performance, recorded in the fall of 2014 at the National Hispanic Cultural Center - Journal Theatre in Albuquerque, New Mexico, was the first performance of the work more that 143 years, and was the American premiere. Faithful to the original Shakespearean text, even including an aria Essere o non essere (to be or not to be), this is a once-in-a-lifetime production.
THE CAST
Amleto (Hamlet, Prince of Denmark): Alex Richardson
Claudio (Claudius, King of Denmark): Shannon De Vine
Polonio (Polonius, Lord Chamberlain): Matthew Curran
Orazio (Horatio, Amleto’s friend): Joseph Hubbard
Marcello (Marcellus, a Sentry): Paul Bower
Laerte (Laertes, Polonio’s son): Javier Gonzalez
Ofelia (Ophelia, Polonio’s daughter): Abla Lynn Hamza
Geltrude (Gertrude, Queen of Denmark): Caroline Worra
Lo Spettro (the Ghost): Jeff Beruan
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