Love is in the Air at 60th Festival Puccini in Torre Del Lago

Love is the theme at this summer’s Festival Puccini, dedicated to the magnificent Tuscan composer. Torre del Lago celebrates the 60th anniversary of this festival, where love emanates through Puccini’s music.  This is the only festival in the world dedicated to Puccini that occurs in the very place where it was inspired.

 

Located between Lake Massaciuccoli and the Tyrrhenian Sea, Torre del Lago offers the perfect setting. Festival Puccini holds about 40,000 participants annually in its outdoor theater, Teatro dei Quattromila (named after its original intended seating capacity).

The festival takes place just a stone’s throw away from the “Villa Puccini”, where Giacomo Puccini lived and worked from 1900 to 1921. He was forced to move to Viareggio in 1921 when pollution from the lake became too hazardous. Puccini is buried in a small chapel beside the music room in Villa Puccini.

 

The Festival Puccini presents four to five opera productions of Puccini’s most beloved operas each season. This season, they are performing La Bohème (1896), Madama Butterfly (1904),  Il Trittico (1918), and Turandot (1926).

Celebrating the 110th anniversary of the premiere of Madame Butterfly, major Italian opera designer and director Renzo Giacchieri will bring his elegant, renowned opera style to the production.

La Bohème will be directed by Ettore Scola, one of Italy’s most prestigious film directors. Scola provides a fresh, new interpretation to Puccini’s operatic masterpiece.

 

For the first time in forty years, the Puccini Festival is presenting the Trittico (three one-act operas: “Il Tabarro”, “Suor Angelica”, and “Gianni Schicchi”). Festival Puccini created the Puccini 2.0 Project to give young artists career growth opportunities. The talented young singers of this project will perform alongside major artists, such as Amarilli Nizza.

 

During August, the Festival will include five performances of a whole new production of Puccini’s unfinished opera, Turandot. Eclectic artistic director Angelo Bertini adds unique emotion to this opera.

Audiences will listen to the famous aria “Nessun dorma” under the starry night sky in Puccini’s heartland. Love will literally be in the air during this breathtaking performance.