Opera magazine
2021-09-20
“La via della Croce” - Regional Festival of Sacred Music
Second important stage of "La Via della Croce" project, scheduled by the Regional Festival of Sacred Music as part of the events for the 50th anniversary of its foundation, supported by the Caritro Foundation and in collaboration with the Philharmonic Society of Trento. It begins on Wednesday 22 at 5 pm with a round table in Trento at the Vigilianum: a reflection on the mystery of the suffering of Christ with the contribution of the theologian (Chiara Bertoglio), the biblical scholar (Ernesto Borghi) and the art historian (Antonio Viola scj), to prepare for listening to Liszt's Via Crucis. In fact, the enigmatic Lisztian score will be the subject of the musical production proposed by the Festival over the weekend, in three musical evenings: Friday 24 at 20.30 in Trento in the Sala della Società Filarmonica in Via Verdi, then in Bolzano on Saturday 25 at the Auditorium del Conservatory at 5.30 pm and finally in Florence on Sunday 26 September in the Cappella della Croce or Chapel of the Cross of the Duomo at 7.30 pm. The parterre of the performers is large: thanks to the collaboration of the Festival with the Opera di S. Maria del Fiore, that is the ancient Fabbriceria of the Cathedral of Florence founded in 1296, a partnership has been created between the musical chapel of the Florentine Cathedral and artists from Trentino, starting from the Vocal Ensemble ad Maiora to the pianist Lucrezia Slomp, (paired, moreover, with the Roman pianist Claudio Trovajoli), to the reciting voice of Chiara Turrini. From the Lisztian score, of which there are various versions by the same author, the destination of solos, choir and 4-handed piano was chosen, thus engaging alongside the aforementioned choral ensembles and the two soloists on the piano, the voices of the mezzo-soprano Patrizia Scivoletto and by the baritone Claudio Mugnaini while the baton will be alternated by Michele Manganelli director of the Florentine Chapel and Alessandro Arnoldo director of the Ensemble Ad Maiora. The drama of Calvary, described in 1879 by Liszt with a language not only oblivious to any intention, spectacularly virtuosic, dry and gaunt in the melodic dimension, as well as harmonically futuristic, whose modernity at the time did not fail to leave the same "modernist" Wagner baffled. , will be underlined by the recitation of the texts of Alda Merini chosen from her "Poem of the Cross", confirming a spiritual suggestion that the way of Calvary exercises over time the genres, the ways and the fashions of Western culture.
