A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM

Teatro de la Zarzuela newsletter

January 2019

Joaquín Gaztambide’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream was first performed at the Teatro del Circo in 1852. At the time, the Crown (Isabel II) was supporting and encouraging Italian companies and impresarios, to the detriment of the Spanish composers who, in a lengthy venture, managed to achieve a significant position in the musical culture of our country. With this state of affairs, this Dream of Gaztambide’s could be interpreted as a work of parody focusing on the figure of Isabel II. Its origin lies in 1850. Le Songe d’une Nuit d’Été appeared on the billboards of Paris; this was not an adaptation of the Shakespearian work of the same name, but rather a work with a new plot. Success in Paris meant the work was performed all over Europe, and new adaptations appeared. In Spain it was Gaztambide who began to put a Spanish version together.
We are talking about music of high quality and melodic delicacy which, in its day, was much to audiences’ tastes. It alternates moments of great inspiration with others of more everyday style. But this creative imbalance was no more than a habitual characteristic of this writer’s pieces. According to Cotarelo, Gaztambide “brought the audience one of his great musical compositions […] music of great merit, which raised his reputation to the heights of the greatest Spanish maestros”. But, despite all that, the run ended shortly after the work’s première.
Participating in the revival of this comic opera are Miguel Ángel Gómez-Martínez, the veteran musical director, who considers Gaztambide to be “interesting, enjoyable and the holder of an extraordinary musical quality”, and Marco Carniti, the stage director – working for the first time on this stage – who wants to make us enjoy the beauty of a work which cheerfully veers between dream and reality.
The libretto has been complete revamped and the action has moved to the city of Rome in the 1950s. The plot introduces us to an aristocratic Italian lady who has decided to lend her patronage to the filming of the first zarzuela for the big screen, in order to bring this genre to the whole world via the cinema.

	A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM From January 25 till February 10, 2019.
	Lied Cycle - ADRIANNE PIECZONKA Monday, January 28, 2019.
	ROSANA in concert Tuesday, January 29, 2018.
	Concert - ROSA TORRES-PARDO - Music among friends Tuesday, February 5, 2019.
	Didactic concert - EL AMOR BRUJO Thursday 7 and Friday 8 February 2019.

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