Macerata Opera

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The Macerata Opera Festival is a summer opera festival in the town of Macerata, the provincial capital of the Marche region of Italy, with performances of three or four operas offered each July and August.

The Festival began in 1921 with a performance of Verdi’s Aida in the 3,000 seat (plus 6,000 standing places) Arena Sferisterio, a huge neoclassical arena erected in the 1820s as a stadium for a form of handball called pellone. After a disastrous second year due to the performance of La Gioconda being rained out, (and except for a popular concert by Beniamino Gigli in 1929), the Festival did not begin again until 1967. The present layout of the arena allows for the seating of 3,500 to 4,500 people depending upon the specific sets.

By the late 1960s, the festival was established presenting mainly popular 19th and early 20th Century Italian opera, most of which were Macerata premieres. Within ten years, the repertory was gradually broadened to include more modern and foreign works but, for financial reasons, the emphasis was on the bigger crowd-pleasers with as many big name international opera singers as possible. In addition, many Regietheater-style productions were to be found such as film director Ken Russell’s Madama Butterfly set in a brothel and a Franco Zeffirelli Carmen set in a motor cycle gang populated New York city.

With the decline in international singer participation as the 1990s progressed, the last decade has seen a return to popular Italian operas given spectacular productions. From 1992 the Opera Association was founded by the municipality and the Province Association of Macerata to oversee the operations of the festival. In addition to the main summer activities, the Association organizes many other musical events, ranging from the New Music Festival to the performances of baroque music in a number of historical sites and buildings. The Association also organizes international conferences.

Since 2003, the soprano Katia Ricciarelli has been Artistic Director.

Following an extensive 1989 renovation of the 550-seat Teatro Lauro Rossii, some rarer operas have been performed since 1990 in that theatre. Originally named the Teatro Condomini and built by Antonio Bibiena from 1767 and inaugurated in 1774 with Anfossi's Olimpiade, it was renamed in 1872 for the musician Lauro Rossi who was born in the town.