The annual Donizetti festival in Bergamo makes a point of resurrecting less well known Donizetti operas.  In 2022 Chiara e Serafina; Donizetti’s first commission for La Scala, got the treatment.  It’s got some very decent music if you like early Donizetti.  The Sestetto in Act 2 is particularly well constructed and it’s generally tuneful and allows the singers to strut their stuff.

That’s the good news.  The not-so-good news is that the plot is ridiculous and that seems to have driven director/designer Granluca Falaschi to pretty desperate solutions.  Let’s briefly look at the plot.  We are in Majorca during one of Spain’s wars with Algiers.  Ten years prior Don Alvaro and his daughter Chiara were kidnapped by pirates and subsequently framed as traitors by Don Fernando who is the other daughter Serafina’s guardian and plans to marry her for her money.  But Serafina is in love with Don Ramiro and as the opera opens preparations for their marriage are in hand.  There’s a subplot involving the elderly Meschino, Lisetta; with whom he’s in love, and her mother Agnese.  Don Alvaro and Chiara (disguised as a boy) show up but are unrecognised.  One of the pirates is one Picaro, formerly in service with Don Fernando, who plans to use him to get Serafina away from Ramiro.  There’s a secret hideout and tunnels and what nots and it just gets more convoluted and silly.

The commedia dell’arte elements are a bit obvious and that seems to be Falaschi’s starting point.  The Majorcans are all done up as commedia characters with exaggerated make up and prosthetic noses and chins.  The pirates look like Jack Sparrow in a clown mask.  Only Alvaro and Chiara get a naturalistic look.  To cap this the ladies of the chorus get sailor suits with short skirts which might look quite fetching on a 1940s Broadway chorus line but are a bit tough on some of the more mature ladies.  There’s also a lot of stylized movement; conga lines choo-chooing across the stage, bum bumping and so on.  It’s the sort of thing that Laurent Pelly might pull off but not many others!  Frankly I found it irritatingly daft and the lukewarm applause in the theatre suggests I wasn’t the only one.

Musically the performance is rather good.  Both soprano Greta Doveri as Chiara and mezzo Fan Chou as Serafina are solid bel canto singers with excellent coloratura and a good sense of style.  The former is especially good in the big denouement scene at the end.  Hyun-Seo Davide Park singing Ramiro is a tenor with sweet high notes.  Pietro Spagnoli is a buffo bass with solid low notes, great acting and a mastery of the patter song.  Wilhelmina Plizhnikova sings nicely as Lisetta and is a great mover.  Sung-Hwan Damien Park (Picaro) is another buffo specialist who gets the style and Matias Moncado doubles up as both Don Alvaro and his nemesis.  The orchestra is the Orchestra Gli Originali on period instruments and they sound rather good.  The chorus is the Coro dell’accademia Teatro alla Scala and they too are excellent.  Sesto Quadrini conducts and keeps things moving along nicely.

Technical details and values are standard modern Blu-ray and they serve Matteo Richetti’s straightforward video direction very well.  The documentation gives the background, a useful plot summary and a full track listing.  Subtitle options are Italian, English, German, French, Korean and Japanese.

All in all, I think this one is for the Donizetti completists.

Catalogue information: Dynamic Blu-ray DYN57987