GIANNI SCHICCHI

SEPTEMBERFEST

To kick off the season, the newly founded Septemberfest shows that excellence and openness need not be opposites. The highest artistic quality should be accessible to and experienced by the entire breadth of the population. This vision is one of the most important goals of  Serge Dorny. For the opening of the September Festival, Jonas Kaufmann will sing live in Ansbach in the Opera for All concert of the Bavarian State Orchestra. For ten days, we then celebrate the opening of the season with a varied program full of surprises. Operas by Giacomo Puccini, Giuseppe Verdi and Richard Wagner and the ballet productions Liaison and Paradigma with different choreographies will be performed in the Prinzregententheater, the Nationaltheater and the Cuvilliés-Theater. A chamber concert by the Orchestra Academy and a song recital with Christian Gerhaher complete the musical program.

Let us celebrate together! As part of the September Festival, you have the opportunity to purchase tickets for all performances on September 18 and 19 at the standard price of €25 or €15 (tickets in the last three seating categories €8) on all seats. Tickets are available from Sat, 24.07.21 by phone and online sales.

Florence, the year 1299. Rich, old Buoso Donati has died, and his relatives are gathered around his deathbed in expectation of receipt of his material legacy. The rumour, however, is that Buoso has bequeathed everything to the monks. His family feverishly search for his will and discover, as feared, that they have been disinherited. Buoso’s oldest relative, Simone, believes that nothing can be done. But young Rinuccio, his nephew, knows who can help: Gianni Schicchi – an upstart from the countryside, sure, but one who knows every trick in the book. Rinuccio’s suggestion is not altogether unselfish, while he is in love with Schicchi’s daughter Lauretta, and hopes that her father can convince the older Donatis to consent to this coupling of two people from very different social classes. Schicchi, pre-emptively invited by Rinuccio, is so disgusted by the arrogance of Zita and all the other Donatis that he decides that he and his daughter should leave again immediately. But Lauretta, just like her father, begs him to stay and insinuates in a disarming tone that she would rather take her own life. Schicchi then backs down and ultimately has the perfect idea. As nobody but those present are aware of Buoso’s death, he slips into the role of the deceased, makes a fool of the vain doctor, and then, disguised and with an affected voice, composes a new will and testament with the notary in Buoso’s name. He naturally bequeaths the family more than the deceased had, but they must angrily watch as Schicchi then claims the majority of the wealth for himself. None of them dare to uncover the deception, however, as he makes it very clear what kind of punishment would await them as accomplices. At the end, the young couple kiss, while Schicchi turns to the audience and pleads for them to forgive his misdeed in light of the circumstances having benefitted the young lovers.