Amore siciliano – Mediterranean Opera
Amore Siciliano is a mini-opera inspired by the popular Calabrian melody Canzone di Cecilia. Madrigals and cantatas by major composers (Sigismondo d’India, Alessandro Scarlatti, and Cataldo Amodei) intertwine with folk music passed down through oral tradition for centuries, alongside numerous pieces by anonymous Sicilian composers. Thanks to the rediscovery of these previously unperformed works, Cappella Mediterranea has become a sought-after ensemble on the international music scene. Spanning five centuries of musical history, their programme Amore Siciliano invites listeners on a journey through southern Italy, offering an immersion into a musical world shaped equally by folk tradition and art music. By reviving this repertoire, the ensemble establishes a direct link between poetry and early baroque music—a connection that endures in the Mediterranean today through lullabies (ninna-nanna), tarantellas, laments, and love songs.
Amore Siciliano is set in southern Italy and tells a tragic story of love, betrayal and sacrifice. The young Cecilia is engaged to Giuseppe, who is in prison. On Christmas Eve, she meets the powerful nobleman Don Lidio in church, who immediately falls in love with her and promises to free Giuseppe if she returns his love. In order to save her fiancé, Cecilia naively agrees to the proposal. Donna Isabella, Don Lidio's wife, meanwhile discovers her husband's betrayal; as a narrator, she witnesses the events and expresses her anger. In the second act, Giuseppe learns in prison that Cecilia has been unfaithful to him, and Don Lidio and his friend Santino ridicule the whole situation. Don Lidio also invites Cecilia to watch Giuseppe as he is led to the shooting, and she realizes the extent of the deception. Broken by the loss of her beloved and her own fate, she ends up taking her own life.
Stéphanie de Failly, violin
Ronald Martin Alonso, viola da gamba
Eric Mathot, double bass
Rodrigo Calveyra, cornett and recorder
Mélanie Flahaut, bassoon
Marina Bonetti, harp
Mónica Pustilnik, lute
Quito Gato, theorbo
Quito Gato, traditional music arrangements
Francesca Aspromonte, transcription of Southern Italian oral tradition pieces
Ariel Rychter, ornamented basso continuo
