News

 

Il senso del luogo at the IED Headquarters on March, 1
Presentation and conversation with Andrea Molino
 
public presentation of Andrea Molino's Il senso del luogo - Montepulciano at the headquarters of the IED (Istituto Europeo di Design) will take place in Milan on March, 1.
 
Included is a public conversation with Andrea Molino, the composer and cultural manager Filippo Del Corno and Alessio Tiezzi, one of the two pianists featured in the project. The event has been curated by Davide Sgalippa from the IED, who was responsible for the video supervision of the project.
 
Il senso del luogo is a project developed by Molino for the Cantiere Internazionale d'Arte di Montepulciano, together with the IED alumni Marco Ferrari (video designer), Cosma Castellucci (sound designer), and Solian Clerici (interior designer). It was premiered on July 16, 2022 at Montepulciano. The IED, a Higher Education Network in the creative field, was co-producer of the project.
 
The installation will be active throughout the day. The event will be recorded and made available online later.
 
venue: March 1, IED, Milan, via Amatore Sciesa 4 – Opening of the exposition at 3PM, Conversation at 6.30PM
 
more information

 
 

Live video of Molino's A System of Reality available online
World Premiere at the Meta World Festival Belgrade
 
The World Premiere of Andrea Molino's latest work, A System of Reality for viola solo has now been made available by the Meta World Festival Belgrade. It was played by the outstanding Serbian violist Saša Mirkovic who inspired it and to whom it is dedicated.
 
video
 
 
 
 
 
 

Melancholia at Swedish cinemas
 
The first screening of Mikael Karlsson's Melancholia took place on January, 12 at Klarabiografen in Stockholm, it was followed by further screenings around Sweden until January 28.
 
The piece was video recorded live at the Kungliga Operan in Stockholm last Autumn, in occasion of the World Premiere production conducted with great success by Andrea Molino. Royce Vavrek's libretto is based on Lars von Trier's homonymous film.
 
The live recording was broadcast on Swedish Radio on Saturday, 20 at 7pm.
 
more information
reviews
 

 
 
 

Meta World Festival Belgrade
Saša Mirkovic plays Molino's
A System of Reality
 
On December 12, the exceptional Serbian violist Saša Mirkovic plays Andrea Molino's A System of Reality for the first time in front of a live audience. The concert takes place in the frame of the Meta World Festival Belgrade, organized by the Metamorphosis Ensemble Belgrade. The work for viola solo was written on Saša Mirkovic's request and is dedicated to him.
 
"The title quotes an expression repeatedly used by James Baldwin in his Pin Drop Speech in 1965 at Cambridge University", writes Molino about his composition. "The piece reflects … the tension of a particular moment (the protests following the killing of George Floyd by a police officer in Minneapolis in May 2020), between the outrage at a humanly, socially and politically untenable situation and the frustration caused by the pandemic … especially for cultural professionals".
 
The piece was first performed "on air" in the frame of a SWR2 JetztMusik radio programme featuring the Marc Sinan Company and broadcast together with Swarm on December 15, 2022 at 09.05 pm.
 
venue: Belgrade, "Music for 1", Bioskop Balkan, 12.12.2023, 7PM
 
 
 
Molino conducts the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano
Corghi, Chailly and Campogrande at the Piccolo Teatro
 
On December 18, Andrea Molino conducts the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano in a concert at the Studio Melato of the Piccolo Teatro at Milan. The concert, a co-operation between the orchestra and the theatre in the frame of La sinfonica allo studio, is part of a diptych of two concerts dedicated to comtemporary composers.
 
On the programme: Soffio armonico (from Il pungolo di un amore) by Azio Corghi, Newton-Variazioni in the version for chamber orchestra by Luciano Chailly and a World Premiere: Nicola Campogrande's 4 modi di sorridere for string orchestra. The work is a co-commission by the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano together with the O/Modernt Chamber Orchestra and the Festival Virtuoso e Belcanto.
 
In an event before the concert dedicated to Azio Corghi who died in 2022, Andrea Molino will talk with Sonia Bo and Nicola Campogrande, students of Azio Corghi, and with Corghi's son Antonio Corghi, in memory of the important Italian composer.
 
venue: December 18, 2023, Milan, Piccolo Teatro Studio Melato, at 8:30 PM; pre-concert: Scatola Magica of the Teatro Strehler, 7 PM.
 
 

Andrea Molino conducts Karlsson's Melancholia in Stockholm
Reviews from the World Premiere at the Royal Swedish Opera
 
Andrea Molino has conducted with great success the World Premiere of Mikael Karlsson's Melancholia on October, 21 at Stockholm's Royal Swedish Opera. The opera with a libretto from Royce Vavrek is based on Lars von Trier's homonymous film.
 
"The Royal Swedish Orchestra … is conducted steadily by the conductor Andrea Molino through the soundscapes with fine solo efforts, not least from the woodwinds and percussionists.", writes Edward Klingspor (Svenska Dagbladet - SvD, 22.10.2023), and Veronica Maldonado agrees: "The conductor Andrea Molino dispatches the score with efficiency, leaning into every accent and dynamic marking with ardor and occasional lyricism." (The New Criterion, 8.11.2023).
 
"Melancholia is the coolest opera in a very long time ... visually rich, beautiful, and musically exciting.", writes Gunilla Brodrej (Expressen, 22.10.2023), and she continues: "Tightly packed hours under the direction of Andrea Molino. Sometimes it's a wistful lone clarinet, sometimes a rhythmic tutti with extra surround sound. Sometimes vibrant Verdi strings, sometimes showy dances and abysmal, swirling notes created with midi instruments."
 
And all critics unanimously give their compliments to the whole cast: "It feels as if Mikael Karlsson from the beginning was thinking of Lauren Snouffer‘s beautifully melancholic soprano and Rihab Chaieb's stable mezzo. As well as Anne Sofie von Otter as the cynical mother from hell, a role not without humor which she really brings out.”, says Camilla Lundberg (National Swedish Television). Edward Klingspor adds: "One of the main roles is played by the Royal Swedish Opera Chorus, which brilliantly portrays the menacing planet."(Svenska Dagbladet - SvD, 22.10.2023).
 
 

Molino conducts Bjarnason's Opera Brothers
Reviews of the Premiere in Copenhagen's Tunnelfabriken
 
On August 11, Andrea Molino has conducted the Premiere of Daniel Bjarnason's Opera Brothers during the Copenhagen Opera Festival. The production was very well received both by critics and the public, and once more for Andrea Molino:
 
"Malmö's well-playing opera orchestra is conducted by the experienced Italian Andrea Molino, who brilliantly combines the singing of the stage with the sound of the "grave", writes Lars Ole Bonde (Ascolta operamagasinet, 13.8.2023).
 
Kristinaa Mcclelland Jacobsen adds : "The conductor, Andrea Molino, did a great job of bringing the orchestra, soloists and choir together. The balance between the singers and the instruments was very good." (Ungt teaterblod, 13.8.2023).
 
 

Molino conducts Opera World Premiere at Stockholm
Karlsson's Melancholia at the Royal Swedish Opera
 
On October 21, Andrea Molino is back at the Royal Swedish Opera in its 250th season for the World Premiere of Mikael Karlsson's Melancholia.
 
The opera with a libretto from Royce Vavrek is based on Lars von Trier's homonymous film. In the apocaplyptic story the planet Melancholia is on a collision course to the earth. During her wedding reception, the bride Justine discovers the planet. Her bridegroom, her mother and sister try in different ways to calm her, but the planet comes closer and closer…
 
The orchestration is by Michael P. Atkinson and Mikael Karlsson. Director Sláva Daubnerová has worked with Boris Kudlicka (set design), Chrisi Karvonides-Dushenko (costume design), Tom Visser (light design), Mikael Karlsson and Avgoustos Psillas (sound design), and Bartek Macias (video).
 
Andrea Molino conducts the Royal Swedish Orchestra, the Royal Swedish Opera Chorus and a fine cast including Lauren Snouffer (Justine), Rihab Chaieb (Claire), and Anne Sofie von Otter (Gaby).
 
This is Andrea Molino's second appearance at the Royal Swedish Opera. In 2019, he conducted the Premiere of the Swedish first performance of Szymanowksi's Król Roger – and received excellent reviews.
 
The Premiere is broadcast on Swedish National Radio at 3 p.m.
 
Due to a tragic accident, the Royal Swedish Opera was forced to move the World Premiere of Melancholia to October 21 at 3PM.
 
venue: Stockholm, Royal Swedish Opera
Premiere: October 21; further performances: October 24, 28, 30 and November 2 and 4
 
 
 


Molino conducts the birthday concert for Francesco Hoch
Lugano's homage to the Ticino composer who turns 80
 

On October 23, Andrea Molino conducts the Orchestra della Svizzera italiana in a concert entitled Da pietre e orizzonti (From Stones and Horizons) in a homage to Francesco Hoch for his 80th birthday. Molino will conduct the Swiss Premiere of Hoch's composition Triàdia (2016), various World and Swiss chamber music premieres with video and stage actions complete the programme.
 
Francesco Hoch, born on February 2, 1943 at Lugano where he still lives, "represents a real turning point in the Swiss music scene". His first compositions date from the 1970’s, and during his long career he established himself as an important representative of advanced techniques and tendencies and composed about eighty works for orchestra, voice, choir, for the stage and with electronics. He was and is also an important teacher.
 
The chamber music soloists on the stage of the Auditorio Stelio Molo RSI in Lugano are Massimiliano Pascucci (singer), Barbara Zanichelli (singer), Andrej Baranov (violin), Sebastian Braun (violoncello), Igor’ Andreev (piano) and Luciano Zampar (percussions).
 
The concert is part of the festival "Lugano Musica" and is organized by LuganoMusica in collaboration with OSI and RSI.
 
venue: Lugano, Auditorio Stelio Molo RSI, October 23 at 8.30 PM
 
 

Andrea Molino's CREDO on www.chigianaradioarte.it
Broadcast in the frame of the Chigiana International Festival
 

Andrea Molino's multimedia music theatre project CREDO has been broadcast on Sunday, August 13 by the Chigiana International Festival's CHIGIANAradioarteVII.

The World Premiere of CREDO has been performed in Karlsruhe on April 30, 2004, at the Badisches Staatstheater Karlsruhe, with David Moss, Gunnlaug Thorvaldsdottir, Joy Frempong, Fabrica Musica and the Badische Staatskapelle Karlsruhe.

The project's concept focuses on international ethnic and religious conflicts.

It was a co-production between the Badisches Staatstheater Karlsruhe, Klangforum Wien and Fabrica, and has been supported by the European Community, as part of the Culture 2000 project.

The production has since been performed in Rome (Stazione Termini) on November 11, 2004 at the invitation of the Comune di Roma and of the Gorbacev Foundation (on occasion of the annual meeting of Nobel Peace Prize Winners), with the Orchestra del Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, conducted by the composer.

In July, 2005 the project was presented as the opening event of the QMF– Queensland Music Festival in Brisbane, Australia, with the Queensland Symphony Orchestra.

In October 2006 the production was published on DVD by the French music label naïve.

The complete live recording of the performance of the World Premiere ist available online.
 
 
 
Molino conducts Bjarnason's Opera Brothers
August, 11: Premiere in the Tunnelfabrikken

The Premiere is approaching, the rehearsals have started: Andrea Molino conducts Daníel Bjarnason's Brothers during the Copenhagen Opera Festival.

The opera, based on Susanne Bier's feature film Brothers, narrates the story of a soldier, Michael. After a traumatic experience he returns to his familiy, but everything has changed forever.

The piece was written to celebrate Aarhus as European Capital of Culture 2017 for Den Jyske Opera / Danish National Opera in Musikhuset Aarhus and then turned to Iceland's Opera, in the composer's homeland.

Originally conceived for a traditional opera house, Kaspar Holten's award winning production of the World Premiere can now be heard and seen in an unusual setting:Tunnelfabrikken (Tunnel factory), a former industrial hall in Nordhavn (Copenhagen). The factory hosts six sections, one of which is dedicated to "art and culture". It is situated in "the largest and most ambitious metropolitan redevelopment area in Scandinavia" – from a gigantic harbour to an urban ecosystem.

venue: 11.8., 12.8. at 7.30 PM, 13.8. at 16.00 PM

more information

 
 
Andrea Molino: Il senso del luogo – Montepulciano
Cantiere Internazionale d'Arte launches video version
 
The Cantiere Internazionale d'Arte has launched the video version of Il senso del luogo – Montepulciano, the project presented as multimedia installation at the Fortezza Medicea in the 2022 edition of the Festival.
 
The project springs from a fundamental intuition: that the place of an event is an integral part of the narrative content of the event itself. The five pieces of Il senso del luogo – Montepulciano, which continue the experience of The Sense of the Place – Dublin in 2020, were conceived and composed in an intimate relationship with different places and situations in the city, not in a descriptive manner (the pieces neither narrate nor represent the places) but essentially 'theatrical', in the broadest sense of the term.
Marco Ferrari signed for the video, Cosma Castellucci for the sound design, and Davide Sgalippa had the artistic supervision. A special focus is given on various keyboards (played by Alessio Tiezzi and Massimiliano Cuseri) of topical places of the city such as the Teatro Poliziano and Palazzo Contucci with its historic fortepiano; the organs of the Temple of San Biagio, Santa Maria delle Grazie and the Duomo and the harmonium of the Chiesa del Gesù unite in an impossible quartet; the pianos in some private homes, in counterpoint with those in the Istituto Di Musica Henze.
 
The project was commissioned by the Cantiere Internazionale d'Arte in collaboration with IED – Istituto Europeo di Design, Milan.
 
more information
video
 
 
 
Andrea Molino at the Chigiana International Festival
Opening Concert and World Premiere: Reviews and Reactions
 
On July 6 Andrea Molino has conducted the Orchestra della Toscana in the Festival's Opening Concert featuring Berio's Coro with the Coro della Cattedrale di Siena (Chorus Master: Lorenzo Donati) and Voci (Folk Songs II) with Tabea Zimmermann.
 
A "sophisticated concert", as observes Francesco Ermini Polacci (Il Sole 24 Ore): "There are the songs of the Sicilian tradition to innervate Voci (1984): here the protagonist is Tabea Zimmermann (…); around, Andrea Molino, at the helm of the Orchestra della Toscana integrated by the Chigiana Percussion Ensemble, carefully stitches a fabric of references and dialogues." And as for Coro, he continues: "An intercultural dialogue that extends out of all proportion like a sea, in which Molino navigates with vigor and confidence".
 
Andrea Molino's new work La vérité, pas toute had its World Premiere on July, 14. The piece, conceived for 32 voices, 8 percussionists, 16 mobile video cameras and live electronics, "puts a strain on the quality of the Coro della Cattedrale di Siena which has to perform the work by constantly moving and singing in 32 voices with 8 percussionists and many other interventions in movement", states Lorenzo Donati. Nicola Sani, Artistic Director of the Chigiana International festival,underlines: "…the new multimedia creation by Andrea Molino enhances the path of innovation developed in these nine years of Chigiana International Festival & Summer Academy … An extraordinary work which conquers space and builds sound in space, where voices, electronic sounds, percussion and movements come together in an intermediate project: only at the Chigiana.”
 
RAI3 TGR report
 
 
 
Andrea Molino at the Chigiana International Festival
July 6: Molino conducts the Opening Concert
with Berio's Coro and Voci (Folk Songs II)
July 14: World Premiere of Molino's La vérité, pas toute

 
The Accademia Chigiana in Siena has announced the 100th anniversary edition of the Chigiana International Festival. The theme is "Parola" ("Word") and it focuses on the Italian composer Luciano Berio on the 20th anniversary of his death.
 
On July 6, Andrea Molino will conduct the Orchestra della Toscana in the Festival's Inauguration Concert featuring two major works by Luciano Berio: Coro, for 40 voices and 40 instruments (with the Coro della Cattedrale di Siena Guido Chigi Saracini, Chorus Master: Lorenzo Donati) and Voci (Folk Songs II), for viola and orchestra (with Tabea Zimmermann).
 
On July 14, La vérité, pas toute, Andrea Molino's new work, will have its World Premiere populating the extraordinary and evocative spatial dimension of the Chiesa di S. Agostino.
The piece is conceived for 32 voices, 8 percussionists, 16 mobile video cameras and live electronics; Lorenzo Donati will conduct the Coro della Cattedrale di Siena Guido Chigi Saracini and the Chigiana Percussion Ensemble (prepared by Antonio Caggiano), with the sound direction by Alvise Vidolin, joined by Nicola Bernardini, Julian Scordato and Alessandro Fiordelmondo for the live electronics.
The title quotes a televised statement by French philosopher Jacques Lacan: "I always tell the truth. Not all, because to say it all is materially impossible, the words are missing. It is even by this impossibility that truth reaches reality."
The texts are curated by a creative collective of professors and students of Aesthetics, Semiotics and Linguistics at Sapienza Università di Roma and Università degli Studi di Cassino e del Lazio Meridionale, centered around the figure of Pietro Montani, Professor Emeritus of Aesthetics at the Department of Philosophy at Sapienza.
On July 14, a public introductory event for the Premiere with Pietro Montani, Andrea Molino, Dario Cecchi, and Riccardo Finocchi, presented by Stefano Jacoviello, is programmed in the ChigianArt Café at 6PM.

venue: July 6, Opening Concert: Siena, Chiesa di Sant'Agostino, 21:15 PM
July 14, La vérité, pas toute (World Premiere), Chiesa di Sant'Agostino, 21:15 PM; introductory event: ChigianArt Café, 18PM

more information
 
 
 

Molino conducts Daníel Bjarnason's Brothers
Opera Premiere at Copenhagen Opera Festival
 

Andrea Molino conducts the Copenhagen revival of the acclaimed and award-winning production of Brothers during the Copenhagen Opera Festival.
 
Premiered in 2017 at the Danish National OperaBjarnason's opera was described as "astonishingly strong and expressive", the production won a Reumert for Opera of the Year in 2018. Kerstin Perski's libretto is based on Anders Thomas Jensen's manuscript for Susanne Bier's feature film Brothers and tells the story of a soldier, Michael, who returns home from the war in Afghanistan with an unbearable secret.
 
The production, a co-production of Den Islandske OperaMalmö Opera and Copenhagen Opera Festival, was signed by Kasper Holten (director), Amy Lane (associate and revival director), Steffen Aarfing (set and costume designer), Ellen Ruge (light design) and Signe Krogh (video design).
 
Molino conducts the Malmö Operaorkester, the Operakoret fra Den Islandske Opera and a cast of international soloist (Oddur Jónsson, Marie Arnet, James Laing, Steffen Jespersen, Eva Jáuregui, Auður Gunnarsdóttir, Jakob Zethner, Michael Bracegirdle, Dénise Beck and Hrólfur Sæmundsson).

venue: 11.8., 12.8. at 7.30 PM, 13.8. at 16.00 PM
 
 
 

Molino conducts Maderna's Requiem
Another rewiew for the CD of the 2009 World Premiere
 
"At the helm of the excellent Chorus and Orchestra of the Teatro La Fenice so dedicated to the resurrection of the score, Andrea Molino, himself a composer, performs the work with remarkable precision and a dramatic sense that reveals all its telluric power. The conductor's healthy authority is matched by a highly effective vocal quartet."
Bertrand Bolognesi, Anaclase
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Molino conducts Mahler / Berio in Padua
Concert in the 3rd edition of Veneto Contemporanea
 

On May, 5 Andrea Molino conducts the Orchestra di Padova e del Veneto in the Sala dei Giganti in the Palazzo Liviano in Padova. On the programme: Gustav Mahler's Fünf frühe Lieder, in the orchestration by Luciano Berio.
 
The baritone Markus Werba interprets the vocal part while musicologist Veniero Rizzardi accompanies the audience through the concert.
 
The concert is part of the festival "Eternal Returns", the 3rd edition of Veneto Contemporanea, dedicated to contemporary Italian composers, taking place in Padua from 15 April to 20 May 2023; it will be recorded by RAI5 television for further boradcast. It is supported by the Fondazione Cariparo.
 
venue: 5 May – Padua, Sala dei Giganti in the Palazzo Liviano, 20.45 PM
 
 
 

Five stars for Andrea Molino
Review of the Sydney Concert
 
On March, 17 Andrea Molino has conducted for the first time a concert with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. On the programme: "New York Stories" with music by Bernstein, Ives and Gershwin, also featuring a World Premiere by Australian composer Paul-Antoni Bonetti.
 
Molino got five stars for it from Rebecca Varidel: "Have you ever listened to Bernstein conduct Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue by any chance? This night, at the Sydney Opera House, with conductor Andrea Molino, guest pianist Simon Tedeschi, and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra wins – in my humble opinion – hands down. Even over the Composer Maestro Bernstein himself. … Andrea Molino's poetic and animated conducting style was a performance of beauty in itself." (Sydney Scoop, 27.3.2023)
 
Other critics were of the same opinion. For example Annabelle Drumm: "As an advocate for modern music Molino was the perfect choice for this program. (…) he is clearly well ahead of many other conductors. Let’s hope we see a lot more of him with the larger orchestras and opera companies around Australia. A superb curation. Bravo!" (Sydney Arts Guide, 24.3.2023)
 
And Hugo Mathers agreed: "The iconic “wail” (as Gershwin himself described it) of the opening clarinet glissando sent a chill down the collar of every witness. From that moment, the critical play between the piano and the rest of the ensemble, captained by a muscular, masterful performance from guest conductor Andrea Molino, was a slick pairing. … (Limelight Magazine, 20.3.2023)
 
 
 

Tryout Week for Karlsson's Melancholia
Molino rehearses at Stockholm
 
The World Premiere of Mikael Karlsson's opera at the Royal Swedish Opera Stockholm, conducted by Andrea Molino, is scheduled for October 7, 2023. Melancholia is an adaptation of Lars von Trier’s apocalyptic masterpiece.
 
To prepare the event, a Tryout Week has taken place at the Opera House, bringing together singers, orchestra and conductor Andrea Molino, and of course the composer Mikael Karlsson, not to forget director Sláva Daubnerová, librettist Royce Vavrek and Michael P. Atkinson who orchestrated the music together with the composer.
 
Get an impression of their joint work to prepare the World Premiere with a video on the Royal Opera's Facebook page.
 
 
 

Andrea Molino debuts with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra
Concert on March, 17 with "New York Stories"
 
On March, 17 Andrea Molino will make his long-awaited Sydney Opera House Concert Hall debut with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, conducting a programme entitled "New York Stories". It includes Bernstein's Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, Ives' Central Park in the Dark and Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, featuring the exceptional Australian pianist Simon Tedeschi.
 
"Andrea Molino is one of the rare conductors invited to conduct both operas with Opera Australia and symphonic music with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, the first since the far-off days of Maestro Gianluigi Gelmetti", said Domenico Gentile of Australian SBS Italian in an interview with Molino.
 
In fact, Molino has already conducted numerous premieres for Opera Australia, from Wozzeck to The NoseBluebeard's Castle and, most recently, Le nozze di Figaro.
 
venue: Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House, Friday 17 March, 2023, 7pm; Saturday 18 March, 2023, 7pm; Sunday 19 March, 2023; 2pm
 
more information: Andrea Molino speaks about the concert with Domenico Gentile of SBS Italian (in Italian language).
 
 
 

Swarm on air: Broadcast by Hessischer Rundfunk
Available with an interview with Marc Sinan from March 10, 2023
 
Andrea Molino's Swarm (2019) for solo electric guitar and ensemble of 16 electric guitars (or solo electric guitar and electronics) is broadcast by Hessischer Rundfunk on March 10 at 10.45am in the frame of its programme "Menschen und ihre Musik" and is available online (from 72'16).
 
The work is presented together with an interview with Marc Sinan who performs all the guitars.
 
Swarm is inspired by Molino's attraction to "complex, collective sounds" which often lead him to "musical situations in which organisms of very dense and intense sounds are composed of a very large number of small elements".
 
 
 

Lugano, April 20 – "Aspettando Manfred" in the Tracce –> project
Nine commissions surround Tchaikovsky's symphony

The project Tracce –> (Traces –>), conceived and accompanied by Andrea Molino as Creative Chair, culminates on April, 20 in a concert with Tchaikovsky's monumental Manfred symphony, played by the Orchestra della Svizzera italiana and conducted by Markus Poschner. Andrea Molino introduces the project in a video interview newly published by the OSI.
 
As with the previous concerts of the two season cycle, complementary events accompany the programme, in collaboration with the OSI, the Conservatorio della Svizzera Italiana and the Zurich University of the Arts.
 
This time events revolve around Lord Byron, author of the dramatic poem Manfred, the literary inspiration for the symphony. Like Tchaikovsky, Byron has travelled to Switzerland where he spent the summer of 1816 in the Villa Diodati near Lake Geneva together with friends. Among them: Mary Shelley who in this mansion wrote Frankenstein, and Polidori who here wrote The Vampyre. Thus the concert evening starts with a World Premiere by Oscar Bianchi: Alfredo for orchestra.
 
German composer Marc Sinan contributes with his new multimedia work Seven Spirits. Additionally, seven young Swiss composers were commissioned to create chamber music featuring the villa, its gardens and its surroundings. Their works were performed and filmed on location thanks to the collaboration of the CISA in Locarno. The first one is already online. All the works were commissioned by the OSI.
 
Tracce –> (Traces –>) is a long-term collaboration conceived around a Tchaikovsky cycle between the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana (OSI) and different local organizations and institutions and the involvement of different places as elements - not only dramaturgically but intrinsically, physically, thus creating an organic interaction between different disciplines – between music, audiovisual language and digital art.
 
In one of the cycle's concerts, Molino's own work Chants de fragilité was created by Christian Tetzlaff (vl.) and the OSI conducted by Markus Poschner.
 
venue: LAC, Lugano, April 20, 8:30pm
 
 
 

World Premieres at Rome's Festival Nuova Consonanza
Molino conceives and conducts Il senso del luogo
 

As part of the 59th Festival di Nuova Consonanza, Andrea Molino will once more conduct the Ensemble degli Intrigati in Il senso del luogo, a concert performance featuring core pieces of the contemporary repertoire such as Bruno Maderna's Serenata per un satellite, Luciano Berio's Sequenza VII and Franco Donatoni's Arpège, also included will be two World Premieres by Carmen Fizzarotti and Federico Santori and works by Giorgio Colombo Taccani and Carlo Boccadoro.
 
Molino's own PGD [Presence Generation Devices], especially conceived for this event, will allow all pieces of the programme to be performed in a flow, without interruption. The Ensemble will also populate the multifaceted and intriguing spaces of the Pelanda, giving the concert a theatrical character. From the very moment the audience enters the building, the instrumentalists will accompany its path to the concert hall by moving through the entire space; their sounds will come from all directions, crossing, overlapping, creating journeys, returns, reminders, responses.
 
venue: Rome, December 3, Mattatoio La Pelanda, 7pm
 
 
 

 

Molino's A System of Reality and Swarm "on air"
Broadcast of SWR2 JetzMusik on December 15, 2022
 

In the frame of a SWR2 JetztMusik radio programme featuring the Marc Sinan Company, two of Andrea Molino's latest works: A System of Reality (2020) and Swarm (2019) are broadcast on December 15, 2022 at 09.05 pm.
 
The programme starts with A System of Reality for viola solo, "… composed at the request of the violist Saša Mirkovic, to whom it is dedicated", writes Molino about his piece. "The title quotes an expression repeatedly used by James Baldwin in his "Pin Drop Speech" in 1965 at Cambridge University. The piece reflects… the tension of a particular moment (the protests following the killing of George Floyd by a police officer in Minneapolis in May 2020), between the outrage at a humanly, socially and politically untenable situation and the frustration caused by the pandemic… especially for cultural professionals".
 
Swarm, conceived for solo electric guitar and an ensemble of 16 electric guitars, all of them performed by Marc Sinan, is inspired by Molino's attraction to "complex, collective sounds" which often lead him to "musical situations in which organisms of very dense and intense sounds are composed of a very large number of small elements".
 
 

Premio Abbiati for Live Recording of Maderna's Requiem
2009 World Premiere conducted by Andrea Molino
 
 
Among the award winnners of the 4th Abbiati Disc Prize of the National Association of Music Critics 2022 is the live recording of the 2009 World Premiere of Bruno Maderna's Requiem conducted by Andrea Molino, published by the Italian label Stradivarius.
 
The CD, the jury stated, received the award "for the confidence and intelligence with which Andrea Molino conducts the Fenice ensembles, which prove worthy of the demanding task; like the quartet of soloists."
 
Given 5 Stelle by the Italian journal Musica and the French Diapason d'or, this is the third prize awarded to the CD recorded at La Fenice and performed by Carmela Remigio (soprano), Veronica Simeoni (mezzo soprano), Mario Zeffiri (tenor), Simone Alberghini (bass), and the choir and orchestra of Teatro La Fenice.
 
 
 

Molino conducts at the Royal Opera in Stockholm in 2023
World Premiere of Karlsson's Melancholia
 
 
Andrea Molino will be back in Stockholm at the Royal Swedish Opera in 2023. He will conduct the World Premiere of Mikael Karlsson's Melancholia, a production in the Royal Swedish Opera's 250th Anniversary Season.
 
Karlsson's opera with a libretto by Royce Vavrek is an adaptation of Lars von Trier’s apocalyptic masterpiece.
 
The cast includes Lauren Snouffer, Rihab Chaieb and Anne Sofie von Otter. Sláva Daubnerová signs for the stage direction.
 
Molino thus returns to the Royal Opera where he has conducted with great success in 2019: “The Royal Swedish Orchestra has an incomparable evening under the direction of Andrea Molino”, as one of the excellent reviews stated about the Swedish first performance of Szymanowksi's Król Roger.
 
World Premiere: Stockholm, Royal Swedish Opera, October 7, 2023, playing from October 7 to November 4, 2023
 
 
 

World Premiere: Il senso del luogo – Montepulciano
A music video installation by Andrea Molino
 
 
On July, 16 Andrea Molino's new video installation opens the festival Cantiere internazionale d'arte at Montepulciano. The music video installation consists of five pieces "which continue", as Molino states, "the experience of The Sense of the Place – Dublin in 2020, (and) were conceived and composed in an intimate relationship with different places and situations in the city."
 
As for the Dublin project, Molino's basic idea is "that the place where an event takes place is an integral part of the narrative content of the event itself. As I like to say, the context is part of the text."
 
In the new piece, a special focus is given on instruments, especially "pianos" or "keyboards" of "topical places of the city such as the Teatro Poliziano and Palazzo Contucci with its historic fortepiano; the organs of the Temple of San Biagio, Santa Maria delle Grazie and the Duomo and the harmonium of the Chiesa del Gesù unite in an impossible quartet; the pianos in some private homes, in counterpoint with those in the Hans Werner Henze Institute of Music". Consequently, keyboard instrumentalists Massimiliano Cuseri and Alessio Tiezzi are part of the project.
 
The installation, commissioned by the Cantiere in collaboration with Istituto Europeo di Design (Milan) will be on view throughout the festival and freely accessible later on different digital platforms.
 
venue: July 16, 2022, 4 PM – Montepulciano, Fortezza: opening
video installation open from July 16 to 30, 2022
 
more information
 
 

Two prizes for Maderna-CD conducted by Molino
Live recording of the 2009 World Premiere of Requiem
 
 
The World Premiere of Bruno Maderna's Requiem, one of the outstanding events in La Fenice's season 2009/10, was conducted by Andrea Molino and broadcast by RAI Radio 3, the live recording was published by the Italian label Stradivarius.
 
The recording is not only an important addition to Maderna's early oeuvre, but also has great significance for the 20th century repertoire in general.
 
"The live recording of an authentic event has been released: the first performance of Maderna's early masterpiece, the "Requiem" that he had begun during the war and completed in 1946. The Fenice ensembles led with confidence and intelligence by Andrea Molino proved worthy of the demanding task….", writes Paolo Petazzi on the occasion of the CD-release in Classic Voice, May 2022.
 
In the meantime it has been awarded two important CD prizes: 5 Stelle by the Italian journal Musica and the French Diapason d'or.
 
The accompanying article in Musica states that "Molino's conducting reveals his ability to give each passage what Verdi would call the 'tinta' not only of a single page but of the whole score".
 
And Diapason d'or cites, as one of the reasons for its decision that "… the testimony that reaches us from its world premiere at La Fenice … captivates with a striking intensity: everything is heartfelt … The minute's silence that precedes the applause reflects the deep emotion that emanates from a requiem that is neither nostalgic nor modernist."
 
extracts
 
 

...sì, sì, si sente qualcosa che c'è!
World Premiere of Molino's new clarinet piece
in Radio stART project Corale per Pasolini
 
 
On the night of 21-22 March, Radio stART's Clocks and Clouds has broadcast a collaborative project initiated by Stefano Taglietti to mark the 100th anniversary of Pier Paolo Pasolini's birth.
 
Andrea Molino took part to this project with a new piece for solo clarinet for the project: …sì, sì, si sente qualcosa che c'è!. It was recorded by Francesco Darmanin in collaboration with the Ensemble degli Intrigati, Montepulciano.
 
The title is a quote from Pasolini's movie Che cosa sono le nuvole: „It was one of those experiences that, in a single moment, suddenly make you realise the essence of human existence; one of those moments of pure happiness in which a word seems to correspond perfectly with reality," Molino says. "But, shhh... you don't have to name it, because as soon as you name it, it's gone."
 
...sì, sì, si sente qualcosa che c'è! is available on Vimeo and on Molino's homepage.

 

 

Reviews: Molino conducts Le nozze di Figaro
Mozart Revival at the Sydney Opera, January 27, 2022
 

Molino has conducted Opera Australia's production by David McVicar in January at the Sydney Opera House.
 
"Italian conductor Andrea Molino’s reading of the score honored the timeless humor of Mozart’s conception right from the very opening. With cutting staccato cadential figures and a comedy of exaggerated sforzato accents, the interpretation was a perfect homage", stated Gordon Williams in Opera Wire, 11.2.2022.
 
And colleagues were of the same opinion: more reviews!
 
 

Molino conducts Mozart at the Sydney Opera
Revival of Opera Australia's Le nozze di Figaro
 
 
It is a kind of debut for Molino: for he has conducted operas of the 20th century like King Roger, Wozzeck, The Nose, Bluebeard's Castle, and 19th century – Puccini, Rossini, VerdiBizet –, many of them at Opera Australia. But now, for the first time, a score from the 18th century is on the podium of Sydney Opera, and that of Le nozze di Figaro, a work that Molino particularly appreciates.
 
The work is not only close to his heart musically but also politically. Mozart wrote his opera at the time when the desire to alleviate the suffering of the poor and the lowest strata of society was born in Europe. Molino, as a composer, has also repeatedly dealt with current social and political topics in his works.

"Even with a time gap of over 200 years, the criticism of the ruling class is still clearly tangible in Mozart's work," says Molino in an extensive interview. "Figaro is messing with his boss" – and social conditions are negotiated on a private level, but are integrated into the political one. Molino has further discussed his relationship with the work in a conversation with Limelight Magazine.

The premiere is the revival of a historically accurate production by David McVicar that sets the play in the 17th century – even in Mozart's time, according to the director, the work was not necessarily presented in a contemporary setting.

On stage is an exquisite cast of singers including Mario Cassi (Count), Ekaterina Morozova (Countess), Tommaso Barea (Figaro) Stacey Alleaume (Susanna) and Agnes Sarkis (Cherubino), and the Opera Australia Chorus. They are accompanied by the Opera Australia Orchestra conducted by Andrea Molino.

venue: Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House, January 27, 29, February 1, 3, 5, 10, 14, 16, 18 at 7pm, February 12 at 12pm
 
 

World Premiere of Maderna's Requiem conducted by Molino
Reviews on the release of the Stradivarius-CD
 
 
The World Premiere of Bruno Maderna's long lost Requiem (1946) in La Fenice's season 2009/10 was conducted by Andrea Molino; the live recording has been published by the Italian label Stradivarius.
 
"I was at the concert and it was one of the most astounding and relevant I have ever attended," writes Marco Mazzoleni in his review on the cd. "The premiere performance … was one of the most important cultural operations in the recent history of music. So is this recording. It is an historical document that makes this masterpiece of the twentieth century available to everyone."
 
Paolo Carrador, in Il Giornale della Musica, joins Mazzoleni in this opinion: "Andrea Molino's conducting succeeds in the difficult task of guaranteeing, in the face of a complex score, coherence and constant emotional tension. The orchestra, soloists and chorus are always convincing and involved; together they sign a true masterpiece. Strong and moving moments followone another … the tensions between soloists and choir in the splendid Dies Irae; the enthralling ostinato of the beginning of Domine Jesu where the rhythmic colours of the pianos can be perceived; the poetic setting, the poignant melody of the Agnus Dei; the abstract interweaving, the chasing after each other of the chorus, the soloists and the instrumental parts in a final, epic and stunning Libera me, that fades into a suspended and disquieting silence."
 
And Jean-Charles Hoffelé writes in Clic Musique: "A moving work, it is a major addition to the sacred literature of the twentieth century, and probably the most eloquent Requiem of the last century along with those of Benjamin Britten and John Foulds. The emotion is palpable throughout the recording of the premiere, Andrea Molino exposing the ornate ceremonial, steeped in memories of the golden age of Venetian polyphonists, and the raging turba with incandescent lyricism, doing justice to this Atlantis which tells us where Bruno Maderna's singular genius came from."
 
more information

 

World Premiere of Chants de fragilité with Christian Tetzlaff
Molino's new work in the frame of the OSI Tracce–> project
 
 
Andrea Molino's latest interdisciplinar piece is conceived for the project Tracce–>, initiated by the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana in Lugano for the next two seasons. Molino is the Creative Chair of the project for the next two seasons.
 
"The fragility of the title … is that of memory and at the same time that of sound: it is the fascinating and wonderfully complex threshold around which the instrument begins to vibrate," writes Molino in his commentary on the work.
 
As Tracce–> is conceived as a Tchaikovsky cycle it was obvious to Molino to encompass the music of Tchaikovsky with his own composition, but: "…it was immediately clear to me, that the only legitimate way, at least for me, was to avoid trying to appropriate his sound and expressive world …". Instead, Molino uses "fragments, hints, intuitions, memories" and puts them in different contexts, as for example another main concept of the Tracce–> project, the "narrative exploration and highlighting of the places linked to Tchaikovsky's presence in Switzerland."
 
The piece features a video shot and edited by students of the Locarno International Conservatory of Audiovisual Sciences showing the celebrated violinist Christian Tetzlaff and Robert Kowalski, the OSI's concertmaster, playing in Montreux, Clarens and at the Chillon Castle, the very places where Tchaikovsky wrote his Violino Concerto. An unfamiliar but exciting environment for Tetzlaff: "I was never in such a situation before ... the Castle is an incredible place; it's a wonderful idea, which brings me back to this piece which I play for 30 years now and didn't perform for a while, among other things because of the pandemic." The shooting in Chillon was accompanied by the Swiss national television RSI Rete Uno.

Chants de fragilité – Quatre études sur la persistance de la mémoire, for Solo Violin, 16 Violins in Echo, Live Video and Orchestra will open the OSI concert including the Violin Concerto itself and Tchaikovsky's Sympyhony N. 1, performed by Christian Tetzlaff, Robert Kowalski, 16 violinists of the Conservatorio della Svizzera Italiana and the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana conducted by his principal conductor Markus Poschner.
 
venue: Lugano, LAC – Lugano Arte e Cultura, December 9, 2021, 8.30pm
 
 

World Premiere of Maderna's Requiem conducted by Molino
Stradivarius publishes Live recording of the 2009 event at La Fenice

 
 
Bruno Maderna's Requiem (1946), one of his earliest works, was considered to be lost until it was found in 2006 in a library in New York. The World Premiere, one of the outstanding events in La Fenice's season 2009/10, was conducted by Andrea Molino and broadcast by RAI Radio 3; the live recording of that historic evening is now published by the Italian label Stradivarius.
 
On November 27 in Venice at the Fondazione Ugo e Olga Levi and on November 29 in Padua at the Auditorio Pollini, Andrea Molino and Veniero Rizzardi, the Italian musicologist who discovered and edited the work, could present the CD, whose publication was originally meant to celebrate Maderna's 100th birthday in 2020 but had to be postponed several times because of the pandemic.
 
The cast includes Carmela Remigio (s), Veronica Simeoni (a), Mario Zeffiri (t), and Simone Alberghini (b), with the Orchestra and Chorus of Teatro La Fenice, conducted by Andrea Molino (Chorus Master: Claudio Marino Moretti).
 
extracts

 
 

Andrea Molino: The Garden of Forking Paths
Reports from the World Premiere at Palazzo Madama in Turin
 
 
On November 9, four saxophonists of the SaXemble and four young actors moved through the streets of Turin's historic centre in the spaces of Piazza Castello, gathered in front of Palazzo Madama, entered the palace, arrived in the Gran Salone where an ensemble was playing in front of a live audience, all following a score by Andrea Molino: The Garden of Forking Paths, a project realized in the context of the 5G-Tours European program, a collaboration between the Municipality of Turin, the Fondazione Musei, RAI, TIM, Ericsson Italia and Live-U.
 
The itinerant musicians and performers were audiovisually synchronized with each other and with the Ensemble Fiarì conducted by Marilena Solavagione in the Gran Salone, playing together live in real time thanks to the multimedia system SWARMS that Molino is developing at RAI's Centro di Ricerca in Turin.
 
RAI TG1 national news was among the numerous media featuring the project. La Stampa's critic is clear: "The result is a spectacular artistic exhibition, where technology meets art and culture, propelling the museum into the future." (La Stampa, (09/11/2021)

more information
report RAI TG1
report TGR Leonardo (minute 10:02)
report RAI TG3

 
 

Andrea Molino: The Garden of Forking Paths
World Premiere at Palazzo Madama, Turin, November, 9
 
 
"The place of an event is an integral part of the content of the event itself; the context is part of the text", says Molino. This is the starting point for his new project The Garden of Forking Paths which will have its World Premiere on 9 November, in the context of the 5G-TOURS project, funded by the European Union, with musicians in and around the historic sites of Palazzo Madama and Piazza Castello in Turin.
 
It will use, for the first time, a multimedia system that Molino is developing at RAI's Centro di Ricerca in Turin: SWARMS, as explains Molino, "is a web platform designed to allow a centralised control panel to receive and develop in real time a potentially unlimited number of audiovisual streams, coming live from different locations around the world."
 
"The title of the project is taken from a famous short story by Jorge Luis Borges. It intends to represent both the route map that the musicians will make physically during its execution and the network of ideal and real connections and interactions that led to its realization. Technology is not only “at the service” of the artistic idea, but actively and integrally contributes to the definition of a real new artistic language, making possible a new way of conceiving a live event."
 
Performers are the SaXemble (Zurich), four Speakers (Kyara Russo, Daniel Santantonio, Lucia Corna, Enrica Rebaudo), the Fiarì Ensemble (Torino) conducted by Marilena Solavagione, supported by the Centro di Produzione RAI in Turin under the direction of Maria Baratta.

The Garden of Forking Paths is a collaboration between the City of Turin, the RAI Research Centre, Ericsson, Fondazione Torino MuseiLiveU and TIM.

venue: Turin, November 9, 2021, 3PM, at the Grand Hall of Receptions of Palazzo Madama.
 
more information
 
 




Marc Sinan: Hasretim – Journey to Anatolia
World Premiere of Andrea Molino's new version at Spreehalle Berlin
  
  
The Spreehalle Berlin and Marc Sinan Company have presented a new version of Hasretim – Journey to Anatolia, Marc Sinan's arguably most appreciated multimedia work. Andrea Molino had created the original orchestral arrangement and conducted the World Premiere in 2010 at Hellerau – Europäisches Zentrum der Künste in Dresden (DVD for ECM Records) and then in 2013 at the Philharmonie Berlin for MaerzMusik with the Dresdner Sinfoniker.
 
He has now reshaped the piece for an exciting new Ensemble featuring Oguz Buyukberber, Daniel Eichholz, Gunnhildur Einarsdóttir, Anil Eraslan, Miako Klein, Meinrad Kneer and Derya Yildirim.
 
venue: Spreehalle Berlin, October 9 and 10, .2021
 

 

Molino conducts Bartók at the Sydney Opera House
ABC Classic broadcast still available 
 
 
ABC Classic has broadcast once more the live recording of Bartók's Bluebeard's Castle (ABC Classic, Sunday 24 October, 2021, 7PM AEST), conducted by Andrea Molino at the Sydney Opera House for Opera Australia last March, directed by Andy Morton and Priscilla Jackman and featuring Daniel Sumegi as Bluebeard and Carmen Topciu as Judith.
 
The recording is still available on ABC Classic's website.
 
 
 
 
 

Andrea Molino is appointed the Creative Chair for Tracce –>
An interdisciplinary project for the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana
 
 
Andrea Molino is designated Creative Chair for the project Tracce –>, initiated by the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana in Lugano for the next two seasons.
 
Tracce –> (Traces –>) is a long-term collaboration between the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana (OSI) and different local organizations and institutions, including the Conservatorio Internazionale di Scienze Audiovisive in Locarno. The project is conceived around the Tchaikovsky cycle conducted by the orchestra's Principal Conductor Markus Poschner and intends to create a multi-layered narrative programme which springs from the necessity of rethinking and innovating the very role of an organization like a symphony orchestra as a social entity; that is, in the context of the environment and the community in which it exists.
 
The aim is to bring into play an interdisciplinary, intermedial and innovative dramaturgy. One aspect, as Molino states, "is the focus on the theme of "travel", inspired for example by Tchaikovsky's many stays in Switzerland, and consequently the involvement of different places as narrative elements: The place where "an event takes place thus becomes part of the content of the event itself; as I like to say, the context is part of the text."
 
Two other key elements are interdisciplinary and intermediality on the one hand and the artistic use of digital technology on the other. Demands which were already part of the conception of the successful 2019 Ludwig van Festival, also curated by Andrea Molino for the OSI.
 
Press conference: Lugano, September 30 (before the concert)
Installation: open from September, 28
 
more information (page 9)

 

Achava Festival Thüringen presents World Premiere by Marc Sinan
Andrea Molino conducts Buchenwald part of GLEISSENDES LICHT
Simultaneous concerts in Jena, Buchenwald, Jerusalem, and Berlin
 
 
With Marc Sinan's GLEISSENDES LICHT, Andrea Molino once more conducts a World Premiere by the Turkish-German composer.
 
The project is part of the 2021 edition of the ACHAVA Festival Thüringen in cooperation with the Jena Philharmonic Orchestra, the Staatskapelle Weimar and the Buchenwald and Mittelbau-Dora Memorials Foundation, supported by the 321-2021: 1700 Jahre Jüdisches Leben in Deutschland e. V. with funds from the Federal Ministry of the Interior, Building and Community.
 
Musically, the project connects four places; near the former concentration camp Buchenwald, a boys' choir, rehearsed by Berit Walther, accompanied by the Staatskapelle Weimar conducted by Andrea Molino, sends an impulse to Jena, which the Jena Philharmonic Orchestra, together with the soloist ensemble AuditvVokal Dresden and four singers (Andreas Fischer, Katia Guedes, Johanna Krödel, Johanna Vargas), conducted by Simon Gaudenz, heighten into an oratorio. Other bridges to Jena will be built by the young Israeli actress Hadar Dimand, who will recite texts by Batstehva Dagan in Jerusalem, and the pianist Michael Wendeberg, who will play parts of Sinan's multi-location composition and other works by Mozart, Berg and Schumann on Berlin's Bebelplatz, where the book burnings once took place.
 
From the simultaneous concerts, a multi-layered overall composition emerges through an audiovisual interweaving via livestreaming – a musical ritual of remembering.
 
venue: Volkshaus Jena, 29 September, 20 p.m.; programme segments from Buchenwald/Weimar, Berlin and Jerusalem will be livestreamed
 
 

World Premiere of Molino's Voci di Chiostro
Molino conducts his work at Montepulciano's Cantiere
 
 
The 2021/22 season has already started for Andrea Molino. On July 25, his new work Voci di Chiostro will receive its World Premiere at of the 46° Cantiere Internazionale d’Arte at Montepulciano.
 
The composition for instrumental ensemble – commissioned by the festival – will be played by the Ensemble degli Intrigati, conducted by Andrea Molino
 
The text, spoken and performed by the cellist of the ensemble, is taken from the "Libro di Ricordi" (1447-1833) and relates to the Church of Sant'Agnese, where the concert takes place. Molino has selected fragments in which accounts are given of construction works on the monastery's historic cloister.
 
The concert programme, entitled SERENATE POLIZIANE, also includes works by Bruno Maderna, Kaija Saariaho and Magnus Lindberg and World Premieres by Alessandra Ravera and Matteo Belli.
 
venue: Montepulciano, Chiostro di Sant’Agnese, July 25 at 9.30 PM
 
 
 

Molino conducts Bartók at the Sydney Opera House
ABC Classic broadcast on April 11
Reviews of the Premiere of Duke Bluebeard's Castle on March 1, 2021
 
 
On March 1, Andrea Molino conducted the Opera Australia Orchestra for the Opera Australia production of Bartók's Duke Bluebeard's Castle, at the Joan Sutherland Theatre in Sydney, with Daniel Sumegi (Duke Bluebeard) and Carmen Topciu (Judith).
 
The live audience was delighted by the performance and the critics were equally enthusiastic. Helen Musa wrote "The opening night audience at Sydney Opera House greeted the cast of Bluebeard’s Castle with more rounds of applause than any within my living memory." (Canberra City News, 4.3.2021). Deborah Jones had much the same impression: "It’s a tremendously absorbing score that earned conductor Andrea Molino and the Opera Australia Orchestra a mighty and sustained ovation from the opening night audience." (Limelight Magazine, 2.3.2021).
 
"A stark and dark Opera Australia production, (…) led superbly by Italian conductor Andrea Molino", wrote Steve Moffatt (Daily Telegraph, 8.3.2021), and Jeremy Eccles also paid tribute to the arrangement: "Interestingly, maestro Andrea Molino is credited as orchestra arranger as well as conductor. The Italian, who seems to be brought in for the OA's more outré work (The Nose, Wozzeck and King Roger, for example), has reduced the score to cater for the company's diminished pit orchestra. But there was little lost in its impact (…)." (Bachtrack, 2.3.2021).
 
The performance was recorded live at the Sydney Opera House on March, 10. It will be broadcast by ABC Classic on April, 11 at 7pm in the frame of "Sunday Opera", presented by Mairi Nicolson.
 
more information
Bluebeard reviews
ABC Classic
 
 
 
    

Andrea Molino conducts Bluebeard's Castle
Premiere at the Sydney Opera House
 
On March 1, the curtain will rise on a new production of Bartók's only opera, Bluebeard's Castle, at the Joan Sutherland Theatre in Sydney.
 
After many successful productions at Opera Australia, Andrea Molino will conduct the Opera Australia Orchestra in this very special 20th century opera in a staging by Andy Morton (Associate Director: Priscilla Jackman) with lighting designed by John Rayment. Duke Bluebeard, the title role, will be sung by Daniel Sumegi, with Carmen Topciu as his fourth wife, Judith.
 
Opera Australia is currently one of the very few Opera Houses in the world presenting opera in front of a live audience; the 2021 Season started in January after the 2020 Season was interrupted in March, with all subsequent productions cancelled.
 
venue: Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House, March 1, 5, 8, and 10 at 7:30 PM

 

 
 

 

 

Molino's debut at the Royal Opera House London released on DVD
World Premiere of Cathy Marston's The Cellist
 
In February, 2020, the Royal Opera House London invited Andrea Molino to conduct the Royal Opera House Orchestra for a World Premiere: Cathy Marston's first choreography for the Royal Ballet, The Cellist, dedicated to the famous cellist Jacqueline du Pré, with music by Philip Feeney.
 
The very successful production was broadcast live in cinemas worldwide and is now available on DVD.

Andrea Molino: Swarm
New piece for solo electric guitar and electronics
World Premiere – Berlin, October 17, 2020
 
As part of ELEKTROPOLIS, a transmedia concert series by the Marc Sinan Company in the newly opened Spreehalle Berlin, Andrea Molino's new work Swarm will be premiered on 17 October 2020.
 
Swarm is conceived for solo electric guitar and an ensemble of 16 electric guitars; on this occasion the ensemble is achieved through sixteen pre-produced, independent guitar voices which will be heard on 16 tracks from different locations in the room. This "swarm" only gathers for the performance of soloist Marc Sinan (electric guitar), to whom the piece is dedicated.
 
„Molino focuses in Swarm on a sociological image“ reads the event's press communique. The simultaneity of similar but not perfectly synchronized elements and sequences creates what he calls „collective sounds“: sound organisms composed by countless small sound particles, where the single component loses its perceptual relevance in favour of a mesmerizing, immersive and multi-layered hearing experience.
 
"Even as a child I was attracted by complex, collective sounds: The chirping of birds, the communal singing in a football stadium or at demonstrations, raindrops on a tin roof... (...) Another fascinating aspect is the way collective sounds spread through space" comments Molino on his work.
 
The concert features two other compositions (Iva Bittová and Oguz Büyükberber). The entire programme "explores the sonic possibilities of the TRANSFORMATOR – an instrument specially developed for the Spreehalle by composer Marc Sinan together with the ambisonic and wave field synthesis specialist Johannes Scherzer from Taucher Sound".
 
The concert series is a cooperation of the Marc Sinan Company with the Industriesalon e.V., the sound scenographers TAUCHER and the University of Applied Sciences (HTW). Supported by the Hauptstadtkulturfonds and the initiative neue musik berlin e.V.
 
venue: Berlin, Spreehalle, 17.10.2020, 19.30 PM
 
 

Dear Ireland – I want the things
Video now available on Molino's homepage
 
Last April Andrea Molino contributed to a project of the Abbey Theatre in Dublin together with David Moss: Dear Ireland. Their video I want the things was first shown on the theatre's Youtube channel. Now it is available on Molino's homepage.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Andrea Molino conducts World Premiere by Marc Sinan
Am Anfang
as part of Stuttgart's festival DIE IRRITIERTE STADT
 
Andrea Molino and Marc Sinan have worked together on two previous occasions: the World Premiere of Aghet, a project in Commemoration of the Armenian Genocide and the World Premiere of Sinan's Hasretim – Journey to Anatolia were conducted by Molino (a recording has been published by ecm).
 
The next project is on July, 22, when Andrea Molino will conduct the World Premiere of Marc Sinans Am Anfang at the Theaterhaus Stuttgart as part of the festival DIE IRRITIERTE STADT.
 
Am Anfang
is a project of the Marc Sinan Company, the Neue Vocalsolisten and the Stiftung Humboldtforum Berlin. Marc Sinan and the choreographer and performer Kettly Noël "go in search of the origins of the world and explore scientific and mythological creation stories from West Africa and Europe" and "confront traditional and religious music from Mali with contemporary European music. The narrative instrument consists of singing, performance and video art," the composer states.
 
This is why musicians who come from very different traditions work together: Andrea Molino will conduct the avant-garde music ensemble Djiguiya Orchestra from Bamako (Mali), the Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart and the Berlin Marc Sinan Company.
 
Am Anfang 
is invited by the festival DIE IRRITIERTE STADT which takes place in the Theaterhaus Stuttgart and at various locations throughout the city, with performances, actions, city walks, installations and a symposium.
 
venue: July 22, Stuttgart, Theaterhaus, 7:00 and 9:00 PM
more information
 
 

The Sense of the Place – Dublin
A music video series conceived and composed by Andrea Molino
 
13. In one breath has already been published two months ago, 14. Not fast, smooth and deliate is online for some weeks, and 9. Liquid for a few days.
 
They are available on Vimeo, YouTube, and on Andrea Molino's web page.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 


 

Dear Ireland  – I want the things
Abbey Theatre's Digital Project in the Times of Corona
Andrea Molino and David Moss contribute with a monologue
 
What should Ireland write on a postcard to itself? This is one of the questions with which Ireland's National Theatre introduces Dear Ireland, a digital project launched in April/May, 2020. 50 writers have been given a commission to create a monologue, and each of them has chosen an actor to perform it. Thus, in times when direct contact between artists and the public is impossible, the dialogue between them may continue.
 
As the project is conceived to create opportunities to hear and share Ireland’s artistic voices, most of the contributors are Irish. But there are some exceptions, including Italian composer and conductor Andrea Molino. His project I want the things was realized by David Moss. Molino and Moss have worked together many times, especially in Music Theatre projects conceived and composed by Molino like Those Who Speak in A Faint Voice, CREDO, and others.
 
Dear Ireland is a project in the times of Social Distancing: The monologues will not be shown on stage but will be screened in four parts at 7.30pm from April, 28 to May, 1 on Abbey theatre's YouTube Channel.
 
The turn of I want the things is on Wednesday 29 April. From May, 2 the videos will be permanently available.
 
 
 


 


The Sense of the Place – Dublin
A music video series conceived and composed by Andrea Molino
 
Videos 5. Intense, 7. Delicate, not too fast, not too loud and 12. Fragile have been published in March and April, 2020. They are available on Vimeo, YouTube, and on Andrea Molino's web page.

The Sense of the Place – Dublin
A music video series conceived and composed by Andrea Molino
 
The place where a piece is performed as a constituent element of the composition: this is the starting point for The Sense of the Place – Dublin, a series of music videos conceived by Andrea Molino. As Molino writes in his blog; "The location where the event takes place has an aesthetic, artistic and narrative (even more than logistic) influence on the event itself. [...] The context becomes part of the text.“

Recorded in Dublin in 2019, the music videos, shot by filmmaker Christopher Ash, show Deirdre O'Leary (solo bass clarinet), performing Molino's music at various places in Dublin. The video editing as well, realized by Ash and Molino together, is notated in the score and is part of the music composition.

The Sense of the Place – Dublin is conceived in the context of the HOME project, an ongoing multi-media arts project that focuses on the international homeless crises, a production of Lundström Arts Management in collaboration with Comhairle Cathrach, Bhaile Átha Cliath (Dublin City Council), Dublin City Arts Office and Fingal County Council Arts Office.

Starting on January 28, the videos will be published at intervals of about 2 weeks. They will be available on VimeoYouTube, and on Andrea Molino's web page.
  
 

Andrea Molino debutes at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden
February 17 – World Premiere of The Cellist in London
 
The Royal Opera House, London, has invited Andrea Molino to conduct a ballet World Premiere: Cathy Marston's choreography The Cellist. Written in collaboration with Edward Kemp, this is her first work for The Royal Ballet on the Main Stage and it is dedicated to the famous cellist Jacqueline du Pré, who is regarded as one of the most important cellists of all time. Her career, however, ended early because she contracted multiple sclerosis at the age of 28.

The music for The Cellist is also a World Premiere: Philip Feeney has written an original score, and it features, of course, a solo cello, played by Hetty Snell, accompanied by the Royal Opera House Orchestra conducted by Andrea Molino.
 
On the stage: Royal Ballet soloists Lauren Cuthbertson, Matthew Ball and Marcelino Sambé (doubled by Beatriz Stix-Brunell, Cesar Corrales and Calvin Richardson for two performances) and the Royal Ballet perform in a stage set designed by Hildegard Bechtler with ligth design by Jon Clark and costumes by Bregje van Balen.
 
The performance will be broadcast live in cinemas worldwide on February, 25.
 
venue: London, Royal Opera House, Main Stage – February 17, 18, 25, 28 and March 2, 4, always at 7.30 PM
 
more information
rehearsal photos on instagram
rehearsal informations on twitter
rehearsal video on youtube
trailer
  
 

Limelight Magazine picks Wozzeck as one of the "Top Shows of 2019"
Opera Australia's production was conducted by Andrea Molino
 
Limelight, Australia's Classical Music and Arts Magazine, has picked Opera Australia's production of Berg's Wozzeck as one of the "Top Shows of 2019". The distinction is addressed especially to William Kentridge for his direction, Michael Honeyman for the title role, and to Andrea Molino who conducted the Opera Australia Orchestra: "Not only was it dazzling visually with its ever-changing projections, but it was pretty stunning musically too, with [...] conductor Andrea Molino uniting the disturbing dissonance and moments of lush beauty in a powerful reading of the complex, unsettling score."

The co-production between Opera Australia, the Metropolitan Opera, the Salzburg Festival and the Canadian Opera Company in association with the Sydney Festival premiered in the Sydney Opera House in January, 2019, and already then, Limelight's review was clear: "A stunning production, visually and musically, that tips you into a nightmarish world, though the emotion is  sometimes overwhelmed."


more reviews

re reviews

 

 

Andrea Molino debutes with the Orchestre National de Lyon
New Year's Eve at Lyon: Offenbach en fête
 
Andrea Molino will start into the New Year with a series of four concerts, featuring a new collaboration: he will conduct the New Year's Concert with the Orchestre National de Lyon at the great hall of Lyon's Auditorium Maurice Ravel. This is also the starting point for a further cooperation with the orchestra which will continue in 2020.
 
The concert focusses on the Offenbarch bicentenary in 2020. On the program: a compilation of extracts from Offenbach's operettas, as sparkling as it should be for a New Year's Eve.
 
And sparkling also because of the contributing singers: sopranos Véronique Gens and Measha Brueggergosman together with tenor Jean-Paul Fouchécourt in the roles of Venus, Hoffmann or the Baron de Gondremarck among others, in a semi-staged direction by Romain Gilbert with light design by Fabrice Oudin.
 
 
venue: Lyon, Auditorium Maurice Ravel, Grande Salle – December 30 and 31 at 8 PM, December 29 and January 1 at 4 PM
 
 
 

HOME project: Video Trailer  
Andrea Molino creates the music for a new multi-media arts project
First Performance scheduled for autumn 2021 in Dublin 
 
HOME is an ongoing multi-media arts project that focuses on the international homeless crises. Originated by Deirdre O'Leary, created by Deirdre O'Leary, Andrea Molino and Christopher Ash and produced by Lundström Arts Management.
 
The project addresses the theme of homelessness through site specific video contributions, including from people with a lived experience of homelessness. HOME takes the form of a multi-media installation embedded in a live staged music performance.
 
HOME is scheduled to be completed and receive its first performance in Dublin in the autumn of 2021.
 
Part of the project is Andrea Molino's The Sense of the Place_Dublin music video series, recorded in Dublin in 2019, due to be published from January 2020.
 
Solo Bass Clarinet / Deirdre O'Leary 
Music / Andrea Molino 
Filmmaker / Christopher Ash
A production of Lundström Arts Management 
in collaboration with Dublin City Arts Office
 
HOME project: Video Trailer
 

 

Moscow – Tchaikovsky Concert Hall
Andrea Molino conducts Clementine Margaine's Recital
 
"Andrea Molino conducted the New Russia State Symphony Orchestra, giving the sound endless explosive vigor." That's what Maya Krylova wrote on Classical Music News about Andrea Molino's debut at the Tchaikovsky Concert Hall in Moscow. Under his baton, the New Russian State Symphony Orchestra has accompanied French mezzo-soprano Clémentine Margaine for her opera recital.
 
The program focused on French romantic repertoire, with vocal and symphonic highlights from Bizet's Carmen, Massenet's Werther and Saint-Saëns' Samson and Delilah. It also included a slight detour to Italy with Donizetti's La Favorite and, of course, has honoured the eponym of the Concert Hall, Tchaikovsky, with excerpts from The Queen of Spades and The Maid of Orléans.
 
 
venue: Tchaikovsky Concert Hall, Moscow, November 8, 7 PM
  
  
 

Andrea Molino nominated for the Helpmann Awards
 
Andrea Molino has been nominated for the Helpmann Awards in the Best Music Direction category for his conducting of the acclaimed Australian First Performance of Alban Berg's Wozzeck at the Sydney Opera House, premiered on January 25, 2019 with the staging of South African multimedia artist William Kentridge (who is nominated in the Best Direction category).
 
Critics described the the premiere as "an overwhelming triumph" and stated: "Musically, the production is also a thrilling, if challenging ride, with the orchestra rising to the occasion under the baton of the superb Andrea Molino…".
 
The annual Helpmann Awards "recognise distinguished artistic achievement and excellence in the many disciplines of Australia's vibrant live performance sectors". Only four candidates are nominated per category.
 
 
Wozzeck reviews
 
 
 
 


"Beethoven is everywhere", on Lugano's Ludwig van Festival
New post and video on Andrea Molino's RAI-Blog
 
In June, Andrea Molino curated the Ludwig van Festival, with Beethoven's Symphonies played by the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana conducted by Markus Poschner, Kagel's Ludwig van and multimedia installations at the LAC – Lugano Arte e Cultura.
 
Now Molino reflects the event in a text entitled "Beethoven is everywhere", published on his RAI-Blog -qui non 'è perché-. The core of the Festival's concept was to highlight the role of Beethoven's music and personality in contemporary perception and in the media. Molino chose to frame Beethoven's music in the context of Mauricio Kagel's intriguing project Ludwig van, realised in 1970 on the occasion of Beethoven's anniversary.
 
Together with the text, a video about the project is available, showing Andrea Molino in discussion with Denise Fedeli, the Artistic Director of the Orchestra della Svizzera italiana, and with its Principal Conductor, Markus Poschner.
 
 
video
 
 



Andrea Molino curates Lugano's Ludwig van Festival
Beethoven's Symphonies, Kagel's Ludwig van
and a multimedia installation at the LAC – Lugano Arte e Cultura
 
In the framework of the Festival Ludwig van curated by Andrea Molino, five Beethoven symphonies (the 1st, 3rd, 5th, 7th and 9th) will be performed over the course of three concerts by the Orchestra della Svizzera italiana, conducted by Markus Poschner. Two concerts will take place in the Sala Teatro LAC, the 9th Symphony will be presented as an open air event in Piazza Luini, with more than 200 choristers coming from all over the Italian part of Switzerland.
 
But the core of the Festival's concept is to highlight the role of Beethoven's music and personality in the contemporary perception and in the media. Andrea Molino has chosen to frame Beethoven’s music in the context of the intriguing project Ludwig van, realised in 1970, on the occasion of Beethoven's anniversary, by the German-Argentinian composer Mauricio Kagel. The Orchestra will perform a selection of Kagel's fragments during the Beethoven concerts, interacting with video projections. A multimedia installation, featuring Kagel's ironic and provocative film among other materials, will be displayed in the LAC foyer.
 
The makeup of this event involves several local organisations, under Molino's supervision: among others the CISA-Conservatorio Internazionale di Scienze Audiovisive in Locarno will realize all audio-visual components of the project; an Ensemble of students of the Conservatorio della Svizzera italiana (CSI) will play Kagel compositions in the Hall of the Sala Teatro LAC on the nights of the performances.
 
venue: Lugano, June 7 and 8 at Sala Teatro LAC – 20:30PM and June 9, Piazza Luini – 21:00PM
 
  

Andrea Molino conducts Kròl Roger at Stockholm's Royal Opera
Reviews of Swedish First Performance
 
"The Royal Swedish Orchestra has an incomparable evening under the direction of Andrea Molino," that was Bo Löfvendhal's verdict (Svenska Dagbladet, 16.3.2019) after the Premiere on March, 16 of Szymanowski's King Roger (Kròl Roger) with Andrea Molino in the pit of Stockholm's Royal Opera.
 
His colleague Erik Wallrup (Tidskriften OPERA, 20.3.2019) was equally convinced by Molino's conducting: „The Royal Swedish Orchestra performs with wonderful energy under Andrea Molino, allowing the music to flow forward and shimmer a thousand shades, just like the (absent) mosaics in Palermo's Cathedral.”
 
Andreas Wahlberg (Olyrix, 25.3.2019) considered that “...Andrea Molino impresses with his gift to draw a dramatic thread through the nuanced score, knowing how to prepare in advance the sudden revelations of the three acts. If each of them begins as a quite different soundscape from the previous one, Molino manages to continuously shift between different dynamics and musical patterns, which go from a Puccini- and Debussy-like post-romanticism to the dissonances of the 1920s, even highlighting the humorous passages as well as the sound and spatial effects from the pit.”
 
And the public was equally enthusiastic, as Laura Servidei (Bachtrack, 21.3.2019) described: "The Stockholm audience responded with great warmth, paying tribute to the performers with enthusiastic cheering."


more reviews
reviews of the Australian First Performance
 
 
 

Kròl Roger at Stockholm's Royal Opera
Andrea Molino conducts Swedish First Performance on March, 16
 
In May 2017, Andrea Molino was honoured with the Green Room Award for his conducting of an acclaimed production of Szymanowski's King Roger (Kròl Roger) in Sydney and Melbourne, the Australian First Performance of this opera.
 
Now he is back in the pit for another First Performance of this sumptuous opera, this time at Stockholm's Royal Opera. On March, 16, it will be premiered on the Swedish stage, directed by Polish film director Mariusz Trelinski who is surrounded by a mostly Polish team. Not astonishing since this is a co-production with Warsaw's Teatr Wielki where the Premiere took place in December, 2018. The second co-producing stage is the National Theatre, Prague.
 
As for the singers, the roles of King Roger and the Shepherd are sung by Trelinski's compatriots Lukasz Golinski and Arnold Rutkowski, who are joined by two Swedish singers: Elin Rombo as Roxane, and Niklas Björling Rygert, as Edrisi. Molino conducts the Royal Swedish Orchestra, the Royal Swedish  Choir and the Childrens’ Choir from the Adolf Fredrik’s School of Music.<
 
venue: Stockholm, Kungliga Operan, March 16, 19, 27. and April, 2, 10, 18, and 23 at 7 PM. March, 23 at 15 PM

 
reviews of the Australian First Performance

 
 

"This production is an overwhelming triumph."
Andrea Molino conducts Berg's Wozzeck at the Sydney Opera House
 
On January, 25, Andrea Molino was once more at the conductor's desk of Sydney's Joan Sutherland Theatre, this time to conduct Alban Berg's Wozzeck with staging by South African multimedia artist William Kentridge.
 
Reviewers were once more unanimously convinced: "This production is an overwhelming triumph. The conductor, Andrea Molino, understands the score so deeply that by the third scene the musical language seemed completely natural, embracing both lyricism and disjunction comfortably.", wrote Nicholas Routley (Australian Stage Online, 26.1.2019).
 
His colleague Jo Litson fully shares this opinion: "Musically, the production is also a thrilling, if challenging ride, with the orchestra rising to the occasion under the baton of the superb Andrea Molino who unites both the disturbing dissonance and moments of lush beauty in a powerful reading of the complex, unsettling score." (Limelight Magazine, 27.1.2019)
 
Opera Chaser (26.1.2019) wrote: "It’s a feast of extraordinary artistic stimulation of the highest level in a new, grandly signed William Kentridge production. Conductor Andrea Molino matches Kentridge’s gestures head on with Berg’s angular, atonal musical landscape as he sculpts an ever-present tension over the rises, falls and tumbles in the score."
 
For whoever wants to build an own opinion: the live radio broadcast of Opera Australia's production by ABC Classic is available until the end of March, 2019.
 
more reviews
radio interview with Andrea Molino (in Italian)
 
 

Andrea Molino conducts Australian Premiere of Berg's Wozzeck
Staging by South African multimedia artist William Kentridge
 
Andrea Molino will again conduct at the Sydney Opera in January/February 2019. After Kasper Holten‘s King Roger and Barrie Kosky‘s The Nose (the production was recently called "a highlight of Opera Australia’s mainstage season" in Limelight's top opera shows of 2018) Molino is again working with a major director for an important 20th century opera: on the program is the acclaimed production of Berg's Wozzeck in the staging of South African multimedia artist William Kentridge, "his most elegant and powerful operatic treatment yet", as stated by The New York Times.
 
The cast of the Australian Premiere includes baritone Michael Honeyman in the title role and Lorina Gore as Marie. Andrea Molino conducts the Opera Australia Chorus, Opera Australia Children's Chorus and the Opera Australia Orchestra.
 
The co-production between Opera Australia, the Metropolitan Opera, the Salzburg Festival and the Canadian Opera Company in association with the Sydney Festival was premiered with great success at the Salzburg Festival in 2017.
 
Kentridge sets the story in a war situation and the set design by Sabine Theunissen as well as the costumes designed by Greta Goiris are visibly inspired by his characteristic charcoal drawings.
 
The production is accompanied by a series of events. Two retrospective exhibitions will offer an insight into Kentridge's work. The Art Gallery NSW hosts an exhibition curated by the artist. Drawings, sculpture, woodcuts, kinetic theatre installation and rare vintage works can be seen at the Annandale Galleries.
 
And finally Opera Australia's Artistic Director Lyndon Terracini is in conversation with the artist on January 22 at 7:30 PM in the Joan Sutherland Theatre.

The live recording of Wozzeck from the Sydney Opera House will be broadcast by ABC Classics FM on Saturday, February 24, at 7 PM.
 
venue: Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House
January 25 and 30, February 6, 9, 12 and 15 at 7:30 PM
February 2 at 1:00 PM
 
 
 

Andrea Molino conducts Carmen in Xi'an, China
Premiere of a new production at the Shaanxi Opera House
 
Carmen is not only Bizet's best-known work but it is also at the top of the most performed operas worldwide. Andrea Molino has conducted the work on several occasions, including the premieres of the new productions by John Bell at the Sydney Opera House for Opera Australia in June, 2016 and by Jean-Louis Grinda at the Théâtre du Capitole at Toulouse in April, 2018.
 
Andrea Molino will now conduct the Xi'an Symphony Orchestra Chorus and the Xi'an Symphony Orchestra in a new production by Charles Roubaud at the Shaanxi Opera House in Xi'an (central China) with stage design by Emmanuelle Favre and costumes by Cui XiaoDong. On the stage an international cast including Jolana Fogasova (Carmen), Francesco Pio Galasso (Don José), Zoltan Nagy (Escamillo) and Ruth Rosique (Micaëla).
 
venue: Shaanxi Opera House in the Shaanxi Performing Arts Centre,  October 26 and 28
 
 

Andrea Molino conducts Il Turco in Italia
Reviews of the reprise at the Sydney Opera House
 
In August, Andrea Molino returned to the Sydney Opera House for the reprise of the acclaimed 2014 production by Simon Phillips of Rossini's Il Turco in Italia. The 2018 reviews for the reprise are just as impressive as those of the premiere.
 
"The orchestra, led by Andrea Molino, plays with as much joie de vivre as the performers on stage. Together they make this almost silly, yet musically stretching opera, a frivolous musical romp that lifts the spirits and makes life seem a lot brighter," wrote Carol Wimmers (Stage Whispers, 12.8.2018). Angus McPherson (Limelight Magazine, 11.8.2018) stated that "Chorus and orchestra are both in top form under the baton of Andrea Molino...". Bill Stephens (Arts Reviews, 13.8.2018) thought that "...The music is certainly attractive, especially when given the sparkling performance it received on this occasion by the Opera Australia Orchestra under Andrea Molino."
 
Others spoke of the "...tasteful and stylish conducting of Andrea Molino..." (Zoltán Zsabó, Bachtrack, 13.8.2018) and said that "Australian Opera Chorus and Opera Australia Orchestra were both in fine form under the clear and expressive direction of Andrea Molino." (David Barmby, ArtsHub, 14.8.2018)
 
more reviews
 
 

Andrea Molino conducts Rossini at the Sydney Opera House
Reprise of the acclaimed 2014 production of Il Turco in Italia
 
"She's flirtatious, audacious and unspeakably bored. He's geriatric, sycophantic and easily ignored. Add a handsome prince, a gypsy minx, and a poet in need of a plot. Put this classic Rossini in vintage bikinis and a rollicking good time we've got!" That's how Opera Australia announces the reprise of its 2014 production of Rossini's Il Turco in Italia (The Turk in Italy) – the Australian First Performance.
 
Andrea Molino conducted this premiere in Sydney with great success: "It is musically superb. The Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra under the wickedly delightful and exuberant conducting of maestro Andrea Molino is in fine form…", stated Lynne Lancaster (Sydney Arts Guide, 2.2.2014).
 
For the reprise, Molino returns to the Joan Sutherland Theatre, conducting all of the eight performances. The acclaimed production directed by Simon Phillips is, of course, unaltered, and Molino conducts, as for the premiere, the Opera Australia Orchestra and the Opera Australia Chorus. Paolo Bordogna is back in Sydney as the Turk Selim and leads an outstanding cast.
 
Venue: Sydney, Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House
August 10, 15, 23, 25, 28, 30 and September, 1 at 7:30 PM – August 18 at 12:30 PM
 
more information
reviews of the premiere
trailer video
interview with Simon Phillips (director)
 
 
 

Andrea Molino conducts Mahler, Messiaen and Strauss
Reviews of the concert with Thomas Hampson and the MSO

Andrea Molino returned to Australia for a sumptuous concert with Thomas Hampson and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra at Melbourne's Hamer Hall and a second performance the next day at Geelong's Costa Hall. On the program: Mahler's Totenfeier and his Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, sung by Thomas Hampson, Messiaen's Le Tombeau Resplendissant and Tod und Verklärung by Richard Strauss.
 
"It was a night to remember", wrote Ron Jontof-Hutter (J-Wire). "Maestro Andrea Molino conducted with conviction bringing out the vast colours of Mahler’s tonal palette… (and) brought out the best with excellent knowledge of the scores, clear conducting, great attention to detail in dynamics and accurate phrasing."
 
And Paul Selar (OperaChaser) wrote that "…it was especially rewarding to see Andrea Molino conducting with a clear sense of poetry and purpose for tonight's Melbourne Symphony Orchestra concert."
 
more reviews
Molino about the program

 
 

 

 

Andrea Molino conducts Mahler, Messiaen and Strauss
with Thomas Hampson and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
 

Andrea Molino returns to Australia for a sumptuous concert with Thomas Hampson and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra at Melbourne's Hamer Hall and a second performance the next day of the same program at Geelong's Costa Hall.
 
Molino will first conduct Mahler's Totenfeier, after which Thomas Hampson will sing Mahlers Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen. In the second part Messiaen's Le Tombeau Resplendissant will be followed by Tod und Verklärung by Richard Strauss.
 
"The program will introduce the audience to two pieces that they may not be familiar with: Mahler’s Totenfeier and Messiaen’s Le Tombeau Resplendissant", says Molino. "To me the strength of this program is the coherence of its narrative. It’s kind of self-explanatory that all four pieces deal with the theme of death; but in four different and fascinatingly disparate ways."
 
The concert will be recorded live by ABC Classics.
 
more information
 
venue: Melbourne, Hamer Hall, Thursday 7 June 2018 at 7:30pm
Geelong, Costa Hall, Friday 8 June
 
 
 

June 17 ABC Classics FM braoadcast
The Nose conducted by Andrea Molino
 
In February 2018, Andrea Molino conducted Shostakovich's seldom played opera The Nose at the Sydney Opera House, a new production directed by Barrie Kosky. Public and critics were unanimously enthusiastic ("a triumph of the highest order" and "Molino is exceptional").
 
ABC Classics FM recorded the production live at the Sydney Opera House on February 28, it was broadcast on March 1, at 8 pm. ABC Classics has announced that the production will be broadcast once more on June, 17.
 
reviews
 
 
 
 

 

 

Andrea Molino Receives Best Conductor Award
2018 Green Room Award for King Roger in Melbourne
 
Andrea Molino was presented with the 2018 Green Room Award as best conductor for Opera. He was honoured for his conducting of Szymanowski's King Roger (Kròl Roger) directed by Kasper Holten at the Arts Centre Melbourne (State Theatre) in May 2017, the First Performance of this opera in Australia.
 
The award ceremony was held at Melbourne’s Comedy Theatre on Monday 9 April. The Green Room Awards are Australia's premiere arts awards; the prizes are presented in 64 categories of the performing arts.
 
On three occasions Molino has been nominated previously, in the Best Opera Conductor category: in 2016 for his La Bohème for Opera Australia at the State Theatre in the Melbourne Arts Centre, in 2015 for his season of Tosca in Melbourne for Opera Australia, and in 2014 for Verdi's Un ballo in maschera (A Masked Ball) in Melbourne.
 
 
reviewsKing Roger – La Bohème – ToscaUn Ballo in maschera
 
 
 
 

The 18th Meet In Beijing Arts Festival Opening concert
Andrea Molino conducts Opera gala in homage to Rossini
 
On April, 27, Andrea Molino will conduct an opera gala in the concert hall of the National Centre for Performing Arts (NCPA) in Beijing, together with Tan Lihua, the music director of the renowned Beijing Symphony Orchestra. The concert is the opening event of the prestigious Meet in Beijing Arts Festival, and is dedicated to Italian opera, especially to Rossini to celebrate the 150th anniversary of his death.
 
Italy is the invited country of the festival in 2018. The concert is a collaboration between the Ministery of Foreign Affairs of the Chinese People's Republic, the Italian Ministery of Foreign Affairs Farnesina (Ministero degli Affari Esteri e della Cooperazione Internazionale), the Istituto di Cultura Italiana in the Chinese capital together with the Ambasciata d'Italia (Italian Embassy), and the Accademia Chigiana (Siena).
 
Andrea Molino will conduct the Beijing Symphony Orchestra, focussing on Italian opera singers Anna Roberta Sorbo, Sara De Flavis, Pasquale Scircoli, and Diego Savini.
 
 
venue
: Beijing, April 27 – National Centre for Performing Arts (NCPA)
 
 
 

Andrea Molino conducts Carmen at Théâtre du Capitole, Toulouse
Reviews of the performances from April, 6

"Today was one of those performances that made it seem as if one was hearing this extremely familiar work for the very first time. It felt so fresh, so vivid, without any sense of going through the motions or routine." That's how Opera Traveller (16.4.2018) describes the performance of Bizet's Carmen at Théâtre du Capitole, Toulouse, conducted by Andrea Molino.

Charlotte Saulneron (Res Musica, 10.4.2018) confirms that "Carmen is a conductor's opera, intended for a colourful and varied orchestra. Andrea Molino, at the head of the Orchestre Nationale du Capitole, approaches the piece with a jubilant easiness and lively and sensitive conducting, as in the incandescent luminosity of the first theme of the prelude. So much life and momentum for one of the best-known operas in the repertoire, which has yet to reveal all its mysteries!”

As for the details, Emmanuel Andrieu (Opera Online, 17.4.2018) points out that "The line is firm, allusive. The contrasts are underlined with the most subtle science. Poetry is born at every moment out of his attention to the slightest nuance, the slightest word.” And Opera Traveller concludes: "The ‘habanera’ had irresistible swing, the ‘chanson bohème’ whipped up a storm."


more reviews
 
 
 

Andrea Molino conducts new production of Carmen
Théâtre du Capitole, Toulouse – April 2018

 
Carmen is not only Bizet's best-known work but is also at the top of the most performed operas worldwide, and to participate in a production of this most French of all French operas in France is certainly a great honor. In April, Molino conducts Carmen at the Théâtre du Capitole, Toulouse. He knows the score well: he has already conducted Bizet's opera in different occasions, including at the Sydney Opera House for Opera Australia (premiered in June, 2016), always with great success.
 
The new production at Théâtre du Capitole, Toulouse (a co-production with the Opéra de Monte-Carlo) will be directed by Jean-Louis Grinda. The cast includes Clémentine Margaine (who already sang the role of Carmen in Sydney under Molino's conducting), Charles Castronovo (Don José), Dimitry Ivashchenko (Escamillo), and Anaïs Constans (Micaëla). Molino conducts the Orchestre national du Capitole and the Chœur et Maîtrise du Capitole.
 
venue: Théâtre du Capitole, Toulouse
April 6, 10, 13, 17. and 19 at 8 pm and April 8 and 15 at 3 pm
 
more information
introduction to the production (in French)
reviews of the Sydney production
 
 
 

Andrea Molino conducts The Nose
Reviews of the Premiere at the Sydney Opera – February 2018
 
In February 2018, Andrea Molino conducted Shostakovich's seldom played opera The Nose at the Sydney Opera House, a new production directed by Barrie Kosky, and once more, public and critics were unanimously enthusiastic.

Victor Grynberg called the premiere "…a triumph of the highest order with an amazingly rehearsed company of more than 80 performers, and the excellent Opera Orchestra, conducted by the enthusiastic Andrea Molino.” (J-Wire, 25.2.2018)

Murray Black said that "Sustaining tight-knit ensemble and textural clarity, conductor Andrea Molino and the Opera Australia Orchestra captured the music’s spiky astringent sounds, biting rhythms, predominantly acerbic character and often relentless pace." (The Australian, 23.2.2018).

Not astonishing then Deen Hamaker's statement: “In The Nose, Molino is exceptional, leading the Opera Australia Orchestra in a high-octane performance that keeps the vigour and verve of the music moving throughout the two-hour piece." (Sounds Like Sydney, 22.2.2018)

And to quote just one more of the numerous reports, let's hear Zoltán Szabó's opinion: "Much of the performance’s energy is propelled from the pit, governed by Andrea Molino’s vigorous and confident conducting… His empathy with this music, coupled with his no-nonsense, effective conducting style, make him an ideal proponent of this opera." (Australian Book Review, 23.2.2018).
 
more reviews
 
 

Andrea Molino: "The Sense of the Place"
Conference Contribution published in Ambienti Mediali

In June 2016, Andrea Molino participated in the interdisciplinary conference, Interactive Imagination, organized by the Department of Philosophy at Rome's University La Sapienza and the Istituto Svizzero di Roma. The conference papers, including Andrea Molino's essay: "The Sense of the Place", are now available in print, published in Ambienti Mediali in the series Plexus, edited by Dario Cecchi, Martino Feyles, Pietro Montani, Milan (Meltemi) 2018.
 
The conference had undertaken to clarify two issues: the philosophical implications and the creative potentialities of what is defined as "interactive imagination". In his contribution, Molino explains how he was lead to develop an "instrument" which he will use in future projects: "SWARMS, a web platform designed to allow a centralised control panel to receive and develop in real time a potentially unlimited number of audiovisual streams, coming live from different locations around the world, sent by different kinds of devices (firstly, though not exclusively, from widespread means of social communications such as smartphones and tablets)."
 
 
 
 

ABC Classics FM broadcast The Nose conducted by Andrea Molino
 

ABC Classics FM announces to broadcast of Shostakovich's opera The Nose, premiered at the Sydney Opera House on February, 21. The new production, conducted by Andrea Molino and directed by Barrie Kosky, will be recorded live at the Sydney Opera House on February 28 and broadcast on March 1, at 8 pm.
 
The performance can be streamed online worldwide for 28 days following the broadcast date.
 
 
 

 

Andrea Molino nominated for the 2018 Green Room Awards
Best Conductor for Opera for King Roger in Melbourne
 
Conductor Andrea Molino has been nominated in the Best Opera Conductor category of the 2018 Green Room Awards, Australia's premiere arts awards, for his conducting of Szymanowski's King Roger (Kròl Roger) at the Arts Centre Melbourne (State Theatre) in May 2017.

This is Molino's fourth nomination, all of them for conducting Opera Australia productions (La Bohème, Tosca, and Un Ballo in maschera).


reviews of the Premiere at the Sydney Opera





The Nose at the Sydney Opera House

"A lowly official wakes up to find his nose has escaped his face. To add insult to injury, the nose is gallivanting around town wearing a higher rank than his."

That's how Opera Australia introduces us to the story of Shostakovich's seldom played opera The Nose. Andrea Molino starts his 2018 opera season at the Sydney Opera House with this satirical, absurd work after a novel by Nikolai Gogol, composed by the 20 year old Shostakovich in 1927/28. He will conduct an outstanding cast led by Martin Winkler, John Tomlinson, Antoinette Halloran and Alexander Lewis together with Opera Australia Chorus and Opera Australia Orchestra.

The Australian theatre and opera director Barrie Kosky signs for the staging, the set and lighting designer is Klaus Grünberg. The co-production between the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Opera Australia, Komische Oper Berlin and Teatro Real, Madrid was lauded as "terrifically realised, brilliantly inventive and highly entertaining” (The Spectator) at its London premiere.

In fact, at Opera Australia's press conference very impressive tap dancing noses made their Australian pre-premiere appearance, and their success led to the suspicion that The Nose will become one of the hits of the season…
 
 

 
 
more information:

venue
: Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House
February 21, 23, 26 and 28 at 7:30 pm, March 3. at 1:00 pm

Interview with Andrea Molino on SBS Radio Italian
interview with Andrea Molino on SBS Radio German
Trailer of the production



 

Aghet – Project in Commemoration of the Armenian Genocide
Videos of the World Premiere at Berlin's Radialsystem now available
Andrea Molino conducts music by Gedizlioglu, Sharafyan, and Oehring


The concert project Aghet, initiated by Dresdner Sinfoniker and Marc Sinan, commemorates the centenary of the Armenian Genocide. It was first performed in Berlin (Radialsystem) on November 27, 2015, and then toured to Dresden, Belgrade, and Yerevan.

Following a number of protest statements from the Turkish Government, which asked the EU to withdraw its financial support for the project, a performance previously planned for Istanbul on November 13, 2016 was cancelled as the German General Consulate was no longer willing to host it in its Kaisersaal, a decision which attracted considerable attention in the German press. The Manager of Dresdner Sinfoniker, Markus Rindt and Marc Sinan protested against the decision in an open letter to Frank Walter Steinmeier, the German Foreign Minister at the time.

The project featured two World Premieres, by Zeynep Gedizlioglu (Turkey) and Helmut Oehring (Germany) and Vache Sharafyan's (Armenia) Surgite Gloriae (first performance in Germany).

Andrea Molino conducted the Dresdner Sinfoniker together with musicians from Turkey, Armenia, members of the No Borders Orchestra, five soloists (Marc Sinan, guitar; Matthias Worm, viola; Araik Bartikian, duduk; Carl Thiemt, baritone; Friedrich Ilgner, boy soprano), and a female choir (members of the Dresdner Kammerchor and of AuditivVokal).
 
 

Highlights from Molino's 2018 Season

The Nose at the Sydney Opera House

Andrea Molino starts his opera season with Shostakovich's seldom played opera The Nose at the Sydney Opera House. The co-production with the Royal Opera House was well received – "terrifically realised, brilliantly inventive and highly entertaining” (The Spectator) – at its London premiere. The Australian theatre and opera director Barrie Kosky is responsible for the staging of this satirical, absurd work, composed by a young Shostakovich in 1927/28. Andrea Molino will conduct an outstanding cast which will include Martin Winkler, John Tomlinson, Antoinette Halloran and Alexander Lewis together with the Opera Australia Chorus and Opera Australia Orchestra.
 
venue: Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House, February – March 2018
 

Carmen at the Théâtre du Capitole, Toulouse

Carmen in France! Molino has already had a great success with this opera at the Sydney Opera House: "Andrea Molino is a dynamo in the pit, powering things forward from the vigorous overture onwards, yet unafraid to be appropriately bold with rubato when required. He brings out plenty of colour in Bizet’s extraordinary score, the intermezzos with their various delicious woodwind solos a highlight…", that's how Limelight Magazine described the Carmen Premiere in June, 2016. Now Molino will conduct the new production at the Théâtre du Capitole, Toulouse (a co-production with the Opéra de Monte-Carlo). Jean-Louis Grinda will be the director, and the cast includes Clémentine Margaine (who already sang Carmen in Sydney), Charles Castronovo (Don José), Dimitry Ivashchenko (Escamillo), and Anaïs Constans (Micaëla). Molino conducts the Orchestre national du Capitole and the Chœur et Maîtrise du Capitole.
 
venue:
Théâtre du Capitole, Toulouse, April 2018
 
 

Mahler, Messiaen and Strauss in Melbourne
with Thomas Hampson and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra

In June 2018, Molino returns to Australia for a sumptuous concert with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and Thomas Hampson at Melbourne's Hamer Hall. The evening will start with Mahler's Totenfeier, after which Thomas Hampson will sing Mahlers Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, followed by Messiaen's Le Tombeau Resplendissant and Tod und Verklärung by Richard Strauss.
The concert will be recorded live by ABC Classics.
 
venue: Hamer Hall, Melbourne, June 2018

 

The Turk in Italy at the Sydney Opera House

"It is musically superb. The Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra under the wickedly delightful and exuberant conducting of maestro Andrea Molino is in fine form… and the singing is superb." This was one of the many enthusiastic reviews for Molino's conducting of the Australian Premiere of Rossini's musical comedy in January, 2014. For his second appearance in Sydney for the 2018 season, Molino will conduct another season of The Turk in Italy in the staging by Simon Phillips: "One of Opera Australia's brightest, best and most daring shows". Paolo Bordogna will come back to Sydney as the Turk Selim.
 
venue: Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House, August – September 2018
 
 

Molino conducts Kròl Roger at the Melbourne State Theatre
Revival of the First Australian Performance
 
"This superb production is a rare chance to see something rich and strange", that's how The Sydney Morning Herald commented on the First Australian Performance of Szymanowski's Kròl Roger at the Sydney Opera House, conducted by Andrea Molino.

Fortunately there is now one more opportunity to meet with King Roger, his wife Roxana and the mysterious sheperd: The production will now be presented at Melbourne State Theatre.

Opera Australia's co-production with the Royal Opera House, London, was acclaimed both by public and critics. Reviews emphasized that Andrea Molino's "and the orchestra’s sumptuous sounds, supple phrasing and textural clarity revealed every aspect of its multifaceted brilliance" (The Australian), and were amazed that he conducted from memory.

In Melbourne, Andrea Molino conducts a cast led by Arthur Espiritu, Lorina Gore and Michael Honeyman, the Opera Australia Chorus and the Orchestra Victoria.


venue: Arts Centre Melbourne, State Theatre, May 19, 23, 25 at 7:30 pm and 27 at 1:00 pm

 

 

Molino conducts Szymanowski's Kròl Roger
Reviews of the Premiere at the Sydney Opera
 
"Reception on opening night was highly enthusiastic, in a production none of us is likely ever to see bettered." This is how Jason Catlett (TimeOut, 24.1.2017) comments on the Australian First Performance of Szymanowski's masterpiece, conducted by Andrea Molino.
 
“Probably the only conductor in the world to conduct this opera from memory, Andrea Molino deftly moulds the Sydney Children’s Choir, the Opera Australia chorus and orchestra into an intoxicating kaleidoscope of luscious sound to compliment director, Kasper Holten, and designer Steffen Aarfing’s compelling visual concept“, writes Bill Stephens (Canberra Critics Circle, 25.1.2017).
 
"Szymanowki's score is a voluptuously beautiful, imaginatively coloured, stylistically diverse masterpiece. Conductor Andrea Molino and the orchestra’s sumptuous sounds, supple phrasing and textural clarity revealed every aspect of its multifaceted brilliance", writes Murray Black (The Australian, 21.1.2017).
 
Clive Paget, too, is very impressed: "Andrea Molino conducts from memory – yes, from memory! – and builds a most seductive edifice that washes over us with wave upon wave of luxurious orchestral tone..." (Limelight Magazine, 21.1.2017).
 
more reviews

 
 
 




Andrea Molino once more nominated for the Green Room Awards
 
Conductor Andrea Molino has been nominated in the Best Opera Conductor category of the 2016 Green Room Awards, Australia's premiere arts awards, for his La Bohème for Opera Australia at the State Theatre in the Melbourne Arts Centre. The award ceremony is scheduled for March, 27.
 
This is Molino's third nomination for three consecutive years, all of them for conducting Opera Australia productions.
 
The first was in 2014 for Verdi's Un ballo in maschera (A Masked Ball) in Melbourne. The production, with staging devised by the legendary Catalan company La Fura dels Baus, has been described as "a visually stunning, musically first-rate and dramatically provocative production" (Limelight).
 
The second was for his season of Tosca in Melbourne. Molino opened the Opera's Spring Season with this premiere with staging by the legendary John Bell: "...conducting a top, in-form Orchestra Victoria, Andrea Molino executed the musical landscape with immense beauty, bold colour and confident pacing..." (Bachtrack, November 13, 2014).
 
As for Molino's conducting La Bohème, set in the bohemian streets of 1930s Berlin, critics were once more unanimous after its premiere in May 2016. To quote just one of the reviews: "On opening night, Puccini’s score resonated with sensitivity and vigour under conductor Andrea Molino and Orchestra Victoria played with faultless beauty." (Herald Sun, 6.5.2016).
 
reviews La Bohème in Melbourne
reviews La Bohème in Sydney
 
 
  

Andrea Molino conducts Kròl Roger at the Sydney Opera House
Australia’s First Performance of Szymanowski's masterpiece
 
"A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to hear a 20th-century Polish masterpiece", is how Opera Australia announces its next premiere, the Australian First Performance of Szymanowski's opera Kròl Roger at the Sydney Opera House.
 
Andrea Molino conducts this (too) seldom played opera with a cast led by Saimir Pirgu (Shepherd), Lorina Gore (Roxana) and Michael Honeyman (King Roger), the Opera Australia Chorus, Opera Australia Orchestra, and the Children's Chorus Gondwana Choirs.
 
The co-production with the Royal Opera House, London was first performed in Covent Garden and was "rapturously acclaimed" by critics who described Kasper Holten's staging as a "major artistic triumph" (The Telegraph, UK). Set and costumes were designed by Steffen Aarfing, the choreography by Cathy Marston.
 
Opera Australia presents this production in association with the Sydney Festival.
 
venue: Syndey Opera House, Joan Sutherland Theatre, January 20, 28 and 31 at 7:30 pm, February 2, 4, 8, 15 at 7:30pm and 11 at 1:00 pm
 
 
more information


 

"Outstanding Conductor"
2016 OperaChaser Australian Commendation for Andrea Molino
 
Andrea Molino has received the 2016 OperaChaser Australian Commendation "Outstanding Conductor" for his interpretation of Rossini's The Barber of Seville with Opera Australia.
 
Molino has conducted the premiere of Rossini's Opera buffa at Sydney's Joan Sutherland Theatre on January 28, 2016, followed by a further seven performances.
 
In its review (February 14, 2016), OperaChaser wrote: "…conductor Andrea Molino brings the mastery of Rossini's melodious energy and allows it to penetrate and float in fabulous form. … Maestro Molino mixed the tempi with enormous appeal and his soloists all obligingly shaped their vocal delivery to match. All the while, a unified Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra performed at their exquisite best."

 
more information
more reviews

 

 

Project in Commemoration of the Armenian Genocide
Belgrade and Yerevan: Aghet – agit continues its tour
Molino conducts Dresdner Sinfoniker and their Armenian guests

 
After the successful World Premiere at Berlin's Radialsystem V on Novmber 27, 2015 and a representation at the Festspielhaus Hellerau in Dresden, the concert project Aghet, focussing on the Armenian genocide in 1915, gives performances in Belgrade and Yerevan.

As for the World Premiere, Andrea Molino will conduct the Dresdner Sinfoniker together with their guests, members of the National Chamber Orchestra of Armenia. The project, initiated by the Dresdner Sinfoniker's general manager Markus Rindt and by Marc Sinan, commemorates the centenary of the Armenian Genocide with pieces by Zeynep Gedizlioglu (Turkey), Helmut Oehring (Germany), and Vache Sharafyan (Armenia).
 
A concert in a chamber music version previously planned in Istanbul on November, 13 has been cancelled as the German General Consulate was no longer willing to host it in its Kaisersaal, a decision which attracted considerable attention in the German press. Markus Rindt and Marc Sinan have protested against it in an open letter to the German Foreign Minister, Frank Walter Steinmeier.
 
In April, the Turkish delegation to the European Union in Brussels requested the EU to withdraw its support for the project, dedicated to the 100. anniversary of the Armenian genocide. Turkey subsequently stopped its collaboration with EACEA.
 
 
venue
Yerevan, Aram Khachaturian Concert Hall, November 10, 7pm
 
 
 
 

Sugi Opera Gala Concerts in Seoul and Busan
Andrea Molino conducts excerpts from Carmen
Excellent cast for a half scenic version
 
New Carmen for Andrea Molino: He will conduct a half scenic production in Seoul and Busan, (South Korea) for the Sugi Opera.
 
It is his second encounter with Bizet's masterpiece, one of the most successfull operas of the repertoire. The first was a new production at the Sydney Opera House, and critics were unanimous in complimenting him ("Andrea Molino is a dynamo in the pit" – "one of the best orchestral experiences of recent memory").
 
The excellent cast includes Sanja Anastasia in the title role, Gaston Rivero sings Don José, Tatiana Lisnic is Micaëla, and Gezim Myshketa sings Escamillo, accompanied by the Seoul City Philharmonic Orchestra.
 
 
venues
Seoul, Grand Hyatt Seoul, Grand Ballroom Hall, December 1 and 2
Busan, Bexco Auditorium, December 6

 
 

Rai 5 broadcasts Molino's – there is no why here –
Live recording of the World Premiere on Italian TV
 
On October 16 and 18, Italian TV channel RAI 5 (part of Italy's national public broadcasting company RAI) broadcast the live recording of the World Premiere of Andrea Molino's multimedia music theatre project
– there is no why here – (– qui non c'è perché –).
 
– there is no why here –, an international co-production, was premiered on April 24, 2014 by Teatro Comunale di Bologna, directed by the composer.
 
The piece is the final chapter of a trilogy which started with Molino's two previous multimedia projects: CREDO, on ethnic and religious conflicts, and WINNERS, on "winners and losers".
 
Conceived and composed by Andrea Molino, in collaboration with Giorgio Van Straten for the text and the dramaturgy, it takes its title from If This Is A Man by Primo Levi. The basis of the project's dramaturgy is the critical point where the traditional ways of distinguishing between right and wrong, between good and evil, fail – the solitude of man in this condition, the ultimate necessity to assume responsibility.
 
 
An extract of the live recording is online on Opera Platform.
more information
 
 
 

Oslo – Ultima Festival – September, 16
Andrea Molino conducts Stockhausen's Sternklang
 
Sternklang
is a meditative "park music for five groups" of approximately 150 minutes for 21 singers and instrumentalists, widely separated from each other. Microphones, synthesizers, amplification projected via loudspeakers and a percussionist complete the instrumentation of the work, first performed in Berlin's English Landscape Garden (Tiergarten) in 1971.

The Ultima Festival will present this open air event at five separate ‘stations’ around the Ekeberg Sculpture Park in eastern Oslo.

Andrea Molino will conduct the composition for its Norwegian Premiere with the vocal ensemble Nordic Voices and German bass Andreas Fischer, percussionist Kjell Tore Innervik, and students from Norwegian Academy of Music.

venue: Oslo, Ekebergparken – September, 16 at 8pm – free entrance
more information 
 
 
 

Agony and Ecstasy
Andrea Molino conducts soprano Emma Matthews' new opera album

 
The renowned Australian soprano Emma Matthews has recorded her third album Agony and Ecstasy with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Andrea Molino. They know each other well as they have already collaborated, i.e for Matthews' acclaimed Fiorilla in the 2014 Sydney Opera production of Rossini's Il Turco in Italia, conducted by Andrea Molino.
 
"Working with Andrea Molino has been wonderful. We have a lovely trust... You can hear the smile in my voice. We really spark off each other....", Emma Matthews said in an interview given in August to Australia's classical music and arts magazine Limelight.
 
Inspired by words from Verdi’s opera La traviata ("Love is the heartbeat of the whole universe: mysterious, proud, an agony and an ecstasy to the heart", from Violetta's aria in Act I), the album presents eight arias – bel canto by Bellini, Rossini, Verdi, Donizetti and Gounod.
 
Agony and Ecstasy was released on September, 2 on ABC Classics.
 
more information and track list
 
 
 

Reviews
Andrea Molino conducts Bizet's Carmen
Premiere at the Sydney Opera House
 
"Andrea Molino is a dynamo in the pit": That's how Clive Paget (Limelight Magazine) sums up Andrea Molino's conducting in his review of the Carmen Premiere at the Sydney Opera House, and he continues: "(Molino) brings out plenty of colour in Bizet’s extraordinary score, the intermezzos with their various delicious woodwind solos a highlight."

He is not the only one to praise the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra "in fantastic form" under Molino's baton, as Eugene Thinks writes, continuing: "Every subtle orchestration in Bizet’s score was absolutely audible and brought to the fore making this one of the best orchestral experiences of recent memory."

Not astonishing then David Larkin's review (Australian Book Review) in which Molino and the orchstra are described as the "unsung heroes of the night, from the sparkling Prelude to the final despairing echo of José's last cry.".

And Larkin reports that the audience was in agreement with the critics' opinion: "The Entr'acte before Act III, a short idyll representing the brief off-stage happiness of the lovers, was deservedly applauded."
 
more reviews
 
 

Molino conducts Carmen at the Sydney Opera House
New production by Opera Australia
 
Andrea Molino returns once more to the Sydney Opera House for a new production of Bizet's Carmen and is very happy to work once more with director John Bell with whom he has already collaborated for an acclaimed Tosca premiered in 2014 at the Melbourne State Theatre.

"What leads you to love the one person who is going to destroy you?" – that is the question John Bell asks on behalf of Bizet's Carmen, the hero of one of the most popular operas in the repertoire. Thus, the production not only focusses on the psychological aspects of the tragedy but looks underneath the "tale of power, corruption and destruction waiting to be told," as Bell says. The set leads to a "colourful and dangerous world of decaying grandeur" designed by Michael Scott-Mitchell. Teresa Negroponte is responsible for the 1950 costumes.

Andrea Molino conducts French star Clémentine Margaine and Australian favourite Milijana Nikolic as Carmen and an outstanding ensemble, the Opera Australia Chorus, and the Australia Opera and Ballet Orchestra.
 
venue: Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House
performances conducted by Andrea Molino:
June 16, 18 , 21, 25, 29, July 1, 5, 9 and 13 / 7:30 PM

more information
 

Reviews
Melbourne Arts Centre – Molino conducts La Bohème
 
Andrea Molino has once more conducted Opera Australia's La Bohème production, this time at the State Theatre in Melbourne.
 
He knew the production as he had conducted it for Opera Australia's Summer Season opening at the Sydney Opera House on New Year's Eve 2014.
 
As for Sydney, so for Melbourne: critics were unanimous in complementing Molino for conducting with "sensitivity and vigour" (Paul Selar, Herald Sun, 6.5.16), for his maintaining of "a gentle dynamic to Orchestra Victoria’s performance of Puccini’s evocative, romantic score, allowing key woodwind and harp phrases to provide gorgeous colour," (Simon Parris, Man In Chair, 4.5.16), and for his "measured tempi throughout that allowed the music to breathe" (Barney Zwartz, Sydney Morning Herald, 4.5.16).
 
more reviews
 

Rome, June 6-8, 2016
Conference Interactive Imagination
Andrea Molino participates via remote contribution from Australia
 
Andrea Molino has participated in the interdisciplinary conference Interactive Imagination, organized by the Department of Philosophy of Rome's University La Sapienza and the Istituto Svizzero di Roma (June 6-8, 2016). Partners were CIEG, Visual Studies Rome Network, and il lavoro culturale as media partner.
 
The conference has undertaken to clarify two issues: the philosophical implications and the creative potentialities of what is defined as "interactive imagination".
 
Molino took part in the 5th session, Forms of Interactive Imagination II. In his contribution "The Sense of the Space", his starting hypothesis was: "..to be able to fully capture the narrative of an event, the context needs to be considered part of the text," and described the idea of “simultaneity” as "deeply connected with the idea of place as a compositional element". These reflections have led him, as he continued, to develop an “instrument” which he will use in future projects: "SWARMS, a web platform designed to allow a centralised control panel to receive and elaborate in real time a potentially unlimited number of audiovisual streams, coming live from different locations around the world, sent by different kinds of devices (firstly, though not exclusively, from widespread means of social communications such as smartphones and tablets)."
 
more information
 

Love and Friendship according to Puccini
Molino speaks about La Bohème with Australian Radio SBS
 
In May, Andrea Molino conducted Puccini's La Bohème in the Melbourne Autumn Season in a production he knew already as he had opened the Sydney Summer Season with it. In an interview for Australian Radio SBS, he talked about his conducting, about realism in La Bohème, and about his latest own project, a multimedia music theatre about migration to be premiered in 2018.
 
The interview is available in Italian.
 
 
 
 
 
 


 
 
 
 

Andrea Molino has signed open letter to Chancellor Angela Merkel

Andrea Molino together with other artists has signed an open letter instigated by the Dresdner Sinfoniker to Chancellor Angela Merkel and the German Parliament on the debate over the recognition of the Armenian genocide.
 
After the debate on June, 2 in the German Parliament (Bundestag), a resolution proposed by CDU, SPD and Bündnis 90/Die Grünen recognizing the genocide was submitted to a vote in the Bundestag and accepted.
 
Andrea Molino is the music director of the Aghet – agit project. He conducted its world premiere last November at the Radialsystem V in Berlin.

 



La Bohème in Melbourne
Molino returns to Opera Australia
 
Following a very successful engagement conducting Rossini's Barber of Seville in January and February ("Easily the pick of the season so far…"), Andrea Molino returns to Opera Australia in May for Puccini's La Bohème at the State Theatre in Melbourne.
 
It's a production Molino knows already as he has conducted it for Opera Australia (in "…a reading that cannot be faulted and lovingly brings out the numerous colours and effects…"), opening the Summer Season at the Sydney Opera House on the 2014 New Year's Eve.
 
The documentary video Bellezze diverse – Different beauties gives an impression of Molino's conducting and Opera Australia's staging: The setting shows not Paris but the bohemian streets of 1930s Berlin, in the colour and chaos of street fairs and burlesque bars, fairylights and fishnet stockings (leading team: Gale Edwards, director; Andy Morton, revival director, Brian Thomas, set designer, Julie Lynch, costume designer, and John Rayment, lighting designer).
 
In Melbourne, Molino will conduct an outstanding new cast of singers, inlcuding international stars like Lianna Haroutounian as Mimì and Gianluca Terranova as Rodolfo, Orchestra Victoria and the Opera Australia Chorus.
 
venue: Arts Centre Melbourne, State Theatre – May 3, 5, 10, 12, 14, 17, 19, 25 and 28 at 7:30 and May 21 at 1 pm.

 
 
 

Aghet – Project in Commemoration of the Armenian genocide
Turkey requests EU to withdraw support
 
The Turkish delegation to the European Union in Brussels is currently requesting the EU to withdraw its support for the project Aghet – agitby the Dresdner Sinfoniker, dedicated to the 100. anniversary of the Armenian genocide.
 
Andrea Molino conducted the world premiere of the project last November in Berlin, with world premieres by Helmut Oehring and Zeynep Gedizlioglu and a piece by Vache Sharafyan; only a previously accepted commitment prevents him from conducting the performance which is about to happen at the Festspielhaus Hellerau in Dresden.
 
Andrea Molino wishes to express to Markus Rindt and all colleagues of the Dresdner Sinfoniker, to the production team lead by Ben Deiß and to Marc Sinan his complete support in this situation.
 
 
more information: Dresdner SinfonikerMusik in DresdenARD, Süddeutsche ZeitungDer Spiegel
n.tv
 
 
 

– there is no why here –
Molino's multimedia music theatre project available online

Extract from the World Premiere on The Opera Platform
 
An extract of the Bologna World Premiere (April 24, 2014) of Andrea Molino's latest work for the stage has been published online by arte.tv. It is availabe at The Opera Platform, a partnership between Opera Europa, representing 155 opera companies and festivals, the cultural broadcasting channel arte.tv, and 15 theatres from across Europe.
 

 
 
 
 

 

The Kiss
Andrea Molino is the conductor for Nicole Car's debut solo album
 
Together with the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra, Andrea Molino has accompanied Nicole Car for a travel through her French, Italian, Russian, and Czech operatic repertoire. The Kiss was launched in February and received with enthusiasm both by critics and the public.
 
Andrea Molino not only accompanied Ms Car, the CD also contains several orchestral excerpts. Conductor and orchestra thus had an extra opportunity to show themselves at their best:
 
"The AOBO sounds particularly inspired and vibrant in this recording with the Italian Andrea Molino on the podium" (Inge Southcott, The Music Trust)
"The iridescent strings of the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra, conducted by Andrea Molino, are also worth a hat-tip." (Neil Fisher, The Times)
"It’s good to hear such fine playing from the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra under Andrea Molino." (Steve Moffatt, Limelight Magazine)
 
 
more information
 
 
 

A matter of things – conversations for a different theatre
New postings
 
Read and comment:
 
111 bicycles and 9 Harley Davidsons – interaction rhythms in a perfect city
In conversation with Jörg Köppl
 
A forest of grandmothers and a silent quartet
In conversation with Yuval Avital
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

The Kiss
Andrea Molino conducts Nicole Car's debut solo album
 
Soprano Nicole Car's debut solo album, conducted by Andrea Molino, is a showcase of her repertoire in the French, Italian, Russian and Czech operatic repertoire – with arias from Verdi to Puccini, from Tchaikovsky to Cilea. A rarely recorded lullaby from an opera by Smetana gives the album its name: The Kiss (Hubicka).

The CD was launched on February 5 – and almost at once was number one in the ARIA Classical Chart and on the iTunes classical chart in Australia.
 
Andrea Molino and the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra accompany Ms Car and seize the opportunity to present a selection of orchestral excerpts: the Introduction to Act 1 of Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin; the Intermezzo from Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur, the Ouverture to Smetana's Hubicka (The Kiss). Digital purchasers can also download the Polonaise from Act III of Eugene Onegin.
 
more information

 

Sydney Opera House – Molino conducts Il Barbiere di Siviglia
Reviews

 
"It’s what Rossini would have wanted," (Ben Neutze, Daily Review, 29.1.2016) and "Easily the pick of the season so far" (Tom Pillans, Daily Telegraph, 1.2.2016) – this is the summing-up of two of the critics published after the opening night of Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia at the Sydney Opera House.
 
In January and February 2016, Andrea Molino was back at the Sydney Opera House for this production initially premiered at the Melbourne Arts Center, together with a cast of international Rossini specialists, the Opera Australia Chorus, and the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra.
 
"At the helm is maestro Andrea Molino, in whose hands an old warhorse emerges as a frisky young filly. Leaving nothing to routine, he shapes and invigorates each phrase and whips up all the right Rossinian storms," is the performance's description in Limelight (Clive Paget, 29.1.2016)
 
reviews
more information
 
 

Interview on Australian SBS Radio German
Andrea Molino speaks about his career, actual politics,
and a new project
 
The Australian SBS Radio German has published an interview with Andrea Molino (in German). Molino talks about his beginnings as a musician and conductor and about the importance of political themes for his composing.
 
Interview 
(in German)
 
 

Sydney Opera House
Molino conducts Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia
 
Andrea Molino starts his 2016 opera season conducting Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia at the Sydney Opera House.
 
For the 2012 premiere of Opera Australia's production at the Melbourne Arts Centre, Elijah Moshinsky directed Rossini's immortal comedy in a setting inspired by 1920s silent films. The production will now move to the Joan Sutherland Theatre.
 
Molino conducts a cast of international Rossini specialists, including Paolo Bordogna as Figaro and Kenneth Tarver as Almaviva, the Opera Australia Chorus and the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra.
 
Molino will return to Opera Australia in May to conduct La Bohème at the Melbourne Arts Centre, and in June for John Bell's new production of Carmen at the Sydney Opera House.


venue: Sydney Opera House, January 28 and 30, February 4, 6, 10, 17 and 20 at 7:30 pm, February 13 at 1 pm

more information
 
 
 

Aghet Project in Commemoration of the Armenian genocide
Reviews of the World Premiere
 
The concert project Aghet, focussing on the Armenian genocide in 1915, had its Premiere at Berlin's Radialsystem V on Novmber, 27.
 
Andrea Molino conducted the Dresdner Sinfoniker, which was joined by musicians from Turkey, Armenia, members of the No Borders Orchestra, five soloists and a female choir. The programme included two World Premieres by Zeynep Gedizlioglu (Turkey) and Helmut Oehring (Germany)
 
The evening in Berlin was met with enthusiasm by the public.
 
"The ability to ignore history's lessons is ubiquitous. That makes initiatives like this all the more important", Shirley Apthorp said ("A howl of protest", Financial Times, 30.11.2015), and as for the realisation, she continued: "Emphatic conducting from Andrea Molino and sensitive orchestral playing ensured an evening of scrupulous music-making."
 
She was joined in her opinion by Olaf Brühl who wrote, of Gedizlioglu's piece: "The interpretation by the ensemble under the baton of Italian conductor Andrea Molino was excellent, it served the beautiful score in every aspect, and left nothing to be desired on behalf of transparency and expressivity." ("Neue Musik von Zeynep Gedizlioglu, Vache Sharafyan und Helmut Oehring", kultur-extra .de, 2.12.2015)
 
Stefan Amzoll wrote of Andrea Molino as a "musician with a highly physical charisma"; ("Trommelfeuer des Protests", Neues Deutschland, 1.12.2015). "A very strong performance, a revival should be obligatory." Amzoll concluded.
 
Aghet is the third part of a project initiated by Dresdner Sinfoniker and Marc Sinan about the history and culture of Anatolia. After the two Berlin performances, the concert will be performed in Dresden on April, 29 and travel to Belgrade, Yerevan and Istanbul later in 2016.


Live recording of the performance by Deutschlandradio Kultur
reviews

 

 

 

Interview with Andrea Molino

In an interview he recently gave Roberto Cucchi from "I Teatri dell'Est", Andrea Molino speaks about his work as a composer and conductor, about Italian opera and Australian opera life, about conducting his own works and about his "trilogy": CREDO, WINNERS, and qui non c'è perché – .

 

The complete interview (in Italian) is available online.









 

 

 

 

Aghet – Project in Commemoration of the Armenian genocide
Molino conducts World Premiere with Dresdner Sinfoniker
Concert at Berlin's Radialsystem V

Aghet – catastrophe; this is what Armenians call the genocide carried out by the ottoman government in 1915. The Armenian minority was systematically exterminated, up to 1,5 million Armenians died.
 
The concert project Aghet, initiated by Dresdner Sinfoniker and Marc Sinan, commemorates the centenary of this genocide with two World Premieres, by Zeynep Gedizlioglu (Turkey) and Helmut Oehring (Germany) and the first performance in Germany of Vache Sharafyan's (Armenia) Surgite Gloriae.
 
Andrea Molino will conduct this concert project at Berlin's "space for arts and ideas", the Radialsystem V.
 
For this occasion, the Dresdner Sinfoniker will be joined by musicians from Turkey, Armenia, by members of the No Borders Orchestra, and by five soloists (Marc Sinan, guitar; Matthias Worm, viola; Araik Bartikian, duduk; Carl Thiemt, baritone; Friedrich Ilgner, boy soprano) and a female choir (members of the Dresdner Kammerchor and of AuditivVokal).
 
 
venue: Berlin, Radialsystem V, November 27 and 28, 20.00 h
more information
 
 
 
 

A matter of things – conversations for a different theatre
New postings
 
Read and comment:
 
The Collective Sound
The rain on a metal roof, Xenakis in Brussels and Violetta’s death
 
Where decisions are made: Art and the Polis
In conversation with Pietro Montani

 

 

 

 

 

In the 2016 opera season, Andrea Molino will conduct three productions at Opera Australia: Il barbiere di Siviglia, La Bohème and John Bell's new Carmen.

He starts his Australian season in January with Rossini's immortal musical comedy Il barbiere di Siviglia at the Sydney Opera House. In a setting inspired by 1920s silent films, Molino conducts a cast of international Rossini specialists, including Paolo Bordogna as Figaro and Kenneth Tarver as Almaviva, the Opera Australia Chorus and the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra.

venue: Sydney Opera House, January 28 and 30, February 4, 6, 10, 17 and 20 at 7:30 pm, February 13 at 1 pm
more information

 
In May, the curtain rises in Melbourne on the revival of Puccini's La Bohème. Molino knows Gale Edwards' production well as he conducted it last New Year's Eve at the Sydney Opera House. Critics were then unanimous in complimenting him for his "very energetic, passionate and enthusiastic baton" and said that "Puccini’s glorious music had seldom sounded better than on this occasion". In Melbourne, he will realize the score with a new cast of singers, the Orchestra Victoria and the Opera Australia Chorus.

venue: Arts Centre Melbourne, State Theatre, May 3, 5, 10, 12, 14, 17, 19, 25 and 28 at 7:30 and May 21 at 1 pm.
more information

 
For the first night of the new production of Bizet's Carmen, Molino will return to the Sydney Opera House in June. Here he will once more meet director John Bell with whom he already worked for Opera Australia's most successful new production of Tosca at the Melbourne State Theatre in 2014. Andrea Molino conducts French star Clémentine Margaine as Carmen, with Yonghoon Lee as Don José, the Opera Australia Chorus and the Australia Opera and Ballet Orchestra.

venue: Sydney Opera House, June 16, 18, 21, 23, 25, 29 and July 1, 5, 9 and 13 at 7:30
more information
 
 

Annother event in the new season will be the release on ABC Classics in February 2016 of a recently recorded CD: Andrea Molino has conducted the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra for soprano Nicole Car's debut solo album, a rising star of the opera world with regular lead roles with Opera Australia and an upcoming debut with Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. The CD is an intriguing and exciting showcase of French, Italian, Russian and Czech operatic repertoire, including orchestral excerpts.
 

more information

 
 
 
 

 

 
 



Bellezze diverse – Different beauties
Molino conducts Tosca and La Bohème for Opera Australia
Documentary video


Bellezze diverse – Different beauties: This is the title of a documentary video of two Opera Australia productions conducted by Andrea Molino, Tosca and La Bohème. Produced and directed by Giulio Tami, the video is now available online.

Molino at work – but also talking about it: the video shows him rehearsing with the singers and the orchestra. The rehearsal scenes are intervowen with the performances and give an impressive insight of the two productions.

With Tosca, premiered on November 12, 2014, Molino opened the Melbourne Spring Season at the State Theatre with a staging by the Australian doyen of Shakespeare, John Bell, who transplanted Tosca’s story to 1943, when Mussolini’s successors abandoned Rome to the invading German armies.

With La Bohème, in a setting showing the bohemian streets of 1930s Berlin (director: Gale Edwards), Molino conducted Opera Australia's 2014 New Year's Eve event and opened the summer season at the Sydney Opera House.

Critics were unanimous. About Tosca, Paul Selar wrote: "Conducting a top, in-form Orchestra Victoria, Andrea Molino executed the musical landscape with immense beauty, bold colour and confident pacing, exposing their great strengths..." (Bachtrack, November 13, 2014). About La Bohème, Lynne Lancaster wrote: "Musically, the terrific Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra, under the very energetic, passionate and enthusiastic baton of Andrea Molino, is superb, giving a lush, dynamic rendition of Puccini’s much loved sweeping, vibrant score..." (Sydney Arts Guide, January 8, 2015).


video: Bellezze diverse – Different beauties
reviews: ToscaLa Bohème
 
 
 

Abitare possibile – The Possible Dwelling
Aesthetics, architecture and new media
Documentation of an Interview with Andrea Molino
 
 
The identity of mankind's ambience and habitat is actually re-defined by new technologies of information, by the digital revolution.
 
In May, 2013 Andrea Molino participated via live audiovisual connection from Jerusalem in an international conference organized in Ravello by the University of Salerno and other important Italian institutions, addressing this subject.
 
The recently published volume Abitare Possibile – Estetica, Architettura New Media, edited by Pina de Luca, contains the conference proceedings and documents; Molino's statements in his interview with Dario Cecchi are included in the section "Politiche dell'interattività".
 
 
 

A matter of things – conversations for a different theatre
New postings
 

Read and comment:
 
A party, nowhere, one to one
In conversation with Marino Formenti
 
(hyper)Realism and Fear

 
 
 
 
 
 

Belgian Premiere of – there is no why here –
Molino's multimedia music theatre at OPERA XXI Festival
Antwerp, deSingel, May 22 and 23

Andrea Molino's latest theatrical project – there is no why here – is an international co-production. Premiered at the Teatro Comunale di Bologna on April 24, 2014, it now reaches its next stage. On May 22 and 23, co-producer Muziektheater Transparant Antwerp in collaboration with deSingel will stage the production at Antwerp's deSingel with new video materials recorded in Antwerp, as the project's concept requires. Andrea Molino conducts the Brussels Philharmonic.

– there is no why here – (– qui non c'è perché –), conceived and composed by Andrea Molino, in collaboration with Giorgio Van Straten (text and dramaturgy), takes its title from "If This Is A Man" by Primo Levi: it is the answer he received from a guard in Auschwitz who snatched an icicle from him that he wanted to melt to quench his thirst.

After the project's World Premiere, critics and audiences were equally impressed by the subject, its musical and theatrical treatment, and by the performance itself, conducted by the composer and featuring among many others David Moss, Anna Linardou and the BL!NDMAN Ensemble.

The piece is the final chapter of a trilogy which started with Molino's two previous multimedia projects: CREDO, 2003-2004, on ethnic and religious conflicts, and WINNERS, 2005-2006, on "winners and losers".

– there is no why here – is an international project in co-production between the Teatro Comunale di BolognaMuziektheater Transparant Antwerp in collaboration with deSingel in Antwerp, GRAME (Centre National de Création Musicale in Lyon, France), Operadagen Rotterdam and Vlaamse Opera.

Venue: Antwerp, deSingel (Salle rouge) – May 22 and 23

more information
reviews of the World Premiere
 
 
 

A matter of things – conversations for a different theatre
New postings
 
Read and comment:

The performance venue as a communication centre
in conversation with Lyndon Terracini
Artistic Director of Opera Australia
 
 
 





Andrea Molino once more nominated for the Green Room Awards

Conductor Andrea Molino has been nominated in the Best Opera Conductor category of the 2015 Green Room Awards, Australia's premiere arts awards. The nomination is for his season of Tosca in Melbourne for Opera Australia. Molino has opened the Company's Spring Season with this premiere, conducting Orchestra Victoria and an outstanding cast.

Critics were unanimous about his musical realization of Puccini's score: "Andrea Molino conducts Orchestra Victoria in a towering performance. They achieve wonderful variation in tone from gentle humour and playfulness in the first act to driving inevitability in the final scene. Their accompaniment of the major solo pieces was exemplary: subtle, light of touch and driving the passion of the music", was Gregory Pritchard's opinion (Concerto.net, November 17, 2014).

In 2014, Molino was nominated as Best Conductor for Verdi's Un ballo in maschera (A Masked Ball). The Green Room Awards honour outstanding talent in all areas of theatre and the stage in Australia, including musical theatre, opera, circus, alternative and hybrid, cabaret and dance, and reward achievement in performance, production and direction in these areas.


Green Room Awards
more Tosca reviews


 

 

Interview with Australian Radio SBS now available online

 
An interview wich Andrea Molino has given the Australian radio station SBS in January is now available online.
 
With his interview partner, Domenico Gentile, Molino speaks about his last two opera experiences in Australia, Tosca in Melbourne and La Bohème in Sydney. He also talks about his last own work, the multimedia music theatre – there is no why here – (– qui non c'è perché –), premiered in Bologna in 2014, and his next projects.
 
The interview is in Italian; SBS offers radio and television to the 4+ million Australians who speak a language other than English.
 
 
Interview, part one and two
– there is no why here –
Tosca reviews
Bohème reviews
 
 
 

A matter of things – conversations for a different theatre
New postings

 
Read and comment:

Voices and screams, breaths and sighs – for a vocality of human nature
In conversation with Stefano Luigi Mangia
 
 
Calvin, Hobbes, CNN in Iraq and Robin Williams out of focus
Or the language of technology
 
 
Looking for new social rituals
In conversation with Filippo Del Corno,
composer and Culture Councillor of the Municipality of Milan
 
 
 
 

Reviews of the New Year's Eve at the Sydney Opera House
Puccini – La Bohème
Andrea Molino opens Opera Australia's summer season

 
Andrea Molino has once more returned with great success to the Sydney Opera House. This time invited to conduct La Bohème for Opera Australia’s Summer Season, which included a New Year's Eve Gala performance.
 
"Musically, the terrific Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra, under the very energetic, passionate and enthusiastic baton of Andrea Molino, is superb, giving a lush, dynamic rendition of Puccini’s much loved sweeping, vibrant score...", writes Lynne Lancaster (Sydney Arts Guide, January 8, 2015).
 
And Bill Stephens thinks that "Puccini’s glorious music had seldom sounded better than on this occasion. Seemingly pleased with what he was hearing, Maestro Andrea Molino carefully guided the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra through every lush and dramatic nuance of this marvelous score." (Australian Arts Review, January 12, 2015).
 
"Conductor Andrea Molino and the orchestra’s sensitive, well-paced accompaniments realised the score’s combination of lively action and lyrical reflection...", is Murray Black's opinion (The Australian, January 6, 2015), and Lloyd Bradford Syke speaks of a "...lush, loving rendition of Puccini’s score by the consistently fabulous Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra, under Andrea Molino..." (Crikey, January 5, 2015).
 
 
more reviews
 
 

 

 


 
 
 
 

Andrea Molino – Three Mile Island
New video of the complete World Premiere now available

 
Three Mile Island is a multimedia staged concert written by Andrea Molino for the festival Europäische Kulturtage Karlsruhe and premiered at the ZKM in Karlsruhe on March 29, 2012. A second performance took place in Rome (Teatro India, May 21, 2012).
 
With this work Andrea Molino sets out to remind us of a generally forgotten event that took place 30 years ago: the nuclear accident that happened in Three Mile Island on the morning of the 28th March 1997, a tragedy that has been kept out of the limelight, a conspiracy of silence.
 
Besides the documentary video, a new video of the complete World Premiere at Karlsruhe is now available.
 
new video
more information
reviews
 
 
 
 



 
 
 
 
 
 

A matter of things – conversations for a different theatre
New postings

Read and comment:

I want the things
Anton Webern, José Saramago, Jean Améry and the treachery
of metaphors

The Dream of a Thing
In conversation with Mauro Montalbetti
 
For a theatre of reality
In conversation with Guido Barbieri
 
Capriccio and the bombing of Baghdad

 
 
 

New Year's Eve at the Sydney Opera House
Andrea Molino conducts Puccinis La Bohème for Opera Australia
 
 
After the successful premiere of Puccini's Tosca in November, Andrea Molino returns to the Sydney Opera House to conduct La Bohème. The first evening of the series will be for the last night of the year: La Bohème is the New Year's Eve event at the Sydney Opera House.
 
The setting of the production shows not Paris but the bohemian streets of 1930s Berlin, in the colour and chaos of street fairs and burlesque bars, fairylights and fishnet stockings (leading team: Gale Edwards, director; Matthew Barcly and Andy Morton, revival director, Brian Thomas, set designer, Julie Lynch, costume designer, and John Rayment, lighting designer).
A fine cast takes the roles of the bohemians: Maija Kovalevska gives her Australian debut as Mimì, Diego Torre is Rodolfo the writer, Lorena Gore sings Musetta, Andrew Jones incarnates the painter Marcello, David Parkin takes the role of Colline the philosopher and Shane Lowrencev will be Schaunard the musician.
 
Andrea Molino once more conducts the Australian Opera Ballet Orchestra, with the Australian Opera Chorus and Opera Australia's Childrens' Chorus.
 
For the New Year's Eve, the interval is timed for the famous fireworks, and the Sydney Opera House stays open well past the midnight fireworks. And in January, the Berlin bohemians will populate the stage of the Sydney Opera Houes for seven more performances.
 
Venue: Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House

December 31, 2014

further performances:
January 3, 6 , 8, 10, 12, 14, 16 at 7.30 p.m.
 
 
 
 

Molino conducts Tosca at the Melbourne State Theatre
Reviews
 
 
Andrea Molino has opened the Spring Season at the Melbourne State Theatre with Puccini's Tosca. "The audience is swept along in a rollicking, powerful show, with … conductor Andrea Molino drawing a broad sweep and full emotional intensity from the reliably excellent Orchestra Victoria", relates the Sydney Morning Herald (November 13, 2014).

And critics, too, were unanimous: "Andrea Molino conducts Orchestra Victoria in a towering performance. They achieve wonderful variation in tone from gentle humour and playfulness in the first act to driving inevitability in the final scene. Their accompaniment of the major solo pieces was exemplary: subtle, light of touch and driving the passion of the music", is Gregory Pritchard's opinion (Concerto.net, November 17, 2014).

Simon Parris writes: "Maestro Andrea Molino draws a lush, richly coloured rendition of the score from Orchestra Victoria." (Main In Chair, November 13, 2014), and Paul Selar says: "Conducting a top, in-form Orchestra Victoria, Andrea Molino executed the musical landscape with immense beauty, bold colour and confident pacing, exposing their great strengths..." (Bachtrack, November 13, 2014).
 
more reviews
 
 
 
 

A matter of things – conversations for a different theatre
New postings
 
 
Read and comment:
 
Lawrence of Arabia and a new Magic Flute
In conversation with Luigi De Angelis (Fanny&Alexander)
 
The time of things – The concept of simultaneity and the breasts of Janet Jackson
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Melbourne, State Theatre – November 12, 2014
Molino opens Melbourne Spring Season with Puccini's Tosca
 
 
Andrea Molino will conduct one of Puccini's most famous operas in Melbourne at the State Theatre, Melbourne's Arts Centre. After Rossini's Il Turco in Italia, Verdi's Un ballo in maschera and Macbeth, and Carlisle Floyd's Of Mice and Men this is his fifth appearance in a production of Opera Australia.
 
The director is the Australian doyen of Shakespeare, John Bell. He has transplanted Tosca’s story to 1943, when Mussolini’s successors abandoned Rome to the invading German armies. The set, designed by Michael Scott-Mitchell, shows the baroque interior of Rome's Sant'Andrea della Valle in the first act, and contrasts it with a fascist architecture for Scarpia's headquarters. Costume design is by Teresa Negroponte.
 
Martina Serafin (until November 29) and Jacqueline Mabardi will portray the title role, Diego Torre will be their Cavaradossi, and Claudio Sgura will sing Scarpia.
 
Andrea Molino conducts Orchestra Victoria, the Opera Australia Chorus and Opera Australia's Children's Chorus.

Dates: November, 12, 15, 18, 22, 26, 29; December 2, 5, 10 and 13 at 7:30 (November 22 amd December 13 at 1:00 pm)
 
Venue: Arts Centre Melbourne, State Theatre 
 
 
 

A matter of things – conversations for a different theatre

 
Since October, new texts, conversations, quotations, photos are posted on the website http://quinonceperche.blog.rai.it where Andrea Molino has recently launched the blog on “a matter of things – conversations for a different theatre”.
 
The blog is in Italian and English and open to free contributions at any stage of the conversation. Read and comment on the first posts here:
 
A matter of things - conversations for a different theatre

The Sense of the Place
 
Reality, realism and fiction - in conversation with
Giorgio van Straten

 
Coca-Cola at the White House

 
 
 


A matter of things – conversations for a different theatre


Andrea Molino is launching the blog “a matter of things
 - conversations for a different theatre” on the website http://quinonceperche.blog.rai.it.

The blog is in Italian and English, and it will regularly host discussions and conversations about the more significant issues of innovative multimedia musical theatre.

The blog will contain a rich, and only apparently disorganised, series of reflections, notes, quotations, textual and audiovisual conversations with friends and colleagues, with the purpose of charting a course, leaving signs that can guide us on this path. 

A chance for anyone to freely contribute at any stage of the conversation, leaving your comment to help us orientate better in this shared path.

 

Read and comment the first post here.


  

 

Andrea Molino starts new management collaboration

From August 2014, Andrea Molino is starting a collaboration with Stage Door srl, Bologna.
Stage Door srl will work with him on a world wide level except UK and Ireland while the current collaboration with Lundström Arts Management will continue for the UK and Ireland.

Both agencies represent Andrea Molino as a composer and a conductor.

For direct contact please refer to:

world except UK and Ireland                           

UK and Ireland
Stage Door srl
via San Giorgio 4
40121 – Bologna
Italia
Lundström Arts Management
Karina Lundström
86 Ard na Mara
Malahide
Co. Dublin
Ireland

www.stagedoor.it

www.lundstrom-am.com
t ++39 051 262126
f ++39 051 271452
e info@stagedoor.it
t ++353 (0)1 845 0444
mobile ++353 (0)87 242 6122
e info@lundstrom-am.com

 
more info

 

– there is no why here –
Reviews of the World Premiere

Molino's multimedia music theatre work was premiered at the Teatro Comunale in Bologna on April 24, 2014. Critics and audience were equally impressed by the subject, by the means used to treat it musically and theatrically, and by the performance itself, conducted by the composer and featuring among many others David Moss, Anna Linardou and the BL!NDMAN Ensemble.
"It has a double merit", wrote Michele Girardi (Il Corriere della Sera, 1.5.2014): "On the one hand to be music with a strong impact, able to speak to an audience without previously being filtered through barriers of style; on the other to be placed outside of the greyness of academicism, that is the scourge of today's art music. [...] It has the flavour of authenticity." And Michele Donati (Bloggione, 26.4.2014) said that "In short, contemporary opera is not only an intellectually lively product of art, but also an opportunity to reflect on dense, difficult issues: in its abstract and practical dimension it succeeds in speaking to modern audiences with a language that, yes, requires focussing, but is also rewarding, while touching the critical issues of human thought."
About the performance, Marco Beghelli sad that it "...accomplished the maximum possible on a musical level", (Il Resto del Carlino, 25.3.2014), and Magda Ruggeri Marchetti (Artzeblai, 1.5.2014) stated: "Musically the Maestro has obtained a remarkable result thanks to the quality of the orchestra, to the extraordinary performance of the group BLINDMAN, sax and percussion, the perfect work of David Moss helped by three members of the Institute for Living Voice, and Anna Linardou, expert solo singer of the Greek lullaby."

find more reviews
about – there is no why here –

 

 

 

On TV: Verdi's Un ballo in maschera conducted by Andrea Molino
ABC Television showed Opera Australia's production

"A visually stunning, musically first-rate and dramatically provocative production", that's how Clive Paget (Limelight, 17.1.2013) described the production of Verdi's Un ballo in maschera, signed by La Fura des Baus, after its premiere at Opera Australia.
For this production, conductor Andrea Molino has been nominated as "Best Conductor" for the 2014 Green Room Awards.
On May 25, 2014 ABC Television broadcast the successful production announcing: "a visually stunning, ground-breaking tale of deception, disguise and fate in a world where the wealthy have all the power and control the populace."
The production's first night was at the Sydney Opera House on January 16, 2013, it then went to Melbourne and was also shown as a CinemaLive event.
It was presented in association with Sydney Festival 2013 and as part of Opera Australia's Verdi-Festival "Viva Verdi!", in celebration of Verdi's 200th Anniversary in 2013, and co-produced by Teatro Colon, Buenos Aires; La Monnaie, Brussels; Norwegian National Opera & Ballet, Oslo.

watch trailer



World Premiere: – there is no why here –
Molino writes new multimedia music theatre work
April 24, 2014 – Bologna, Teatro Comunale

– there is no why here – (– qui non c'è perché –), conceived and composed by Andrea Molino, in collaboration with Giorgio Van Straten for the text and the dramaturgy, takes its title from "If This Is A Man" by Primo Levi: it is the answer he received from a guard in Auschwitz who snatched an icicle from him that he wanted to melt to quench his thirst.
The piece will be the final chapter of a trilogy which started with Molino's two previous multimedia projects: CREDO, 2003-2004, on ethnic and religious conflicts, and WINNERS, 2005-2006, on "winners and losers".
The basis of the project's dramaturgy is the critical point where the traditional ways of distinguishing between right and wrong, between good and evil, fail – the solitude of man in this condition, the ultimate necessity to assume responsibility.
Consequently, the flow of the performance is created through a continuous sequence of musical-theatrical moments, each one approaching one or more aspects of the theme, connected through a non-narrative but linear dramaturgy. Different materials – texts from different sources, audiovisual contributions, live connections with other locations – closely linked to the main theme, will be worked out in the dramaturgy and inserted into the theatrical language.
The score requires vocal and instrumental soloists, performers, symphony orchestra, live electronics, and live video. Wouter van Looy is the stage director, with scenes and video by the collective WerkTank, Leuven. The vocal cast features David Moss and Anna Linardou as main soloists and includes young vocalists selected in collaboration with the Institute for Living Voice (Artistic Director: David Moss). The instrumental solo parts will be performed by BL!NDMAN (sax) and BL!NDMAN (drums), Brussels. Andrea Molino will conduct the Orchestra del Teatro Comunale di Bologna.
– there is no why here – is an international project in co-production between the Teatro Comunale di Bologna, Muziektheater Transparant Antwerp in collaboration with deSingel in Antwerp, GRAME (Centre National de Création Musicale in Lyon, France), Operadagen Rotterdam and Vlaamse Opera.
The music score is published by RAI trade, Rome. RAI trade dedicates a blog website to the project.

– there is no why here – will be premiered at the Teatro Comunale di Bologna on April 24, 2014.

venue: Bologna, Teatro Comunale, April 24 (8 pm), 26 (6 pm), 27 (3.30 pm), 29 (8 pm)

more information

blog website

 

 

http://thereisnowhyhere.blog.rai.it published by RAI trade
Website dedicated to Molino's new multimedia music theatre
Live video streaming of the final performance of – there is no why here –


Andrea Molino's new multimedia music theatre work, to be premiered in Bologna on April, 24 is accompanied by a website offering a wide range of information about the project. Audiovisual material, backstage information and commentaries show how the production process is developing.

The site, launched by Molino's publisher RAI trade, is updated daily. Reports from the performances and reviews will later complete the site. It will also accompany future performances of the project planned for Belgium and Holland.

From April 29, a live video streaming on the website will make the final performance of – there is no why here – (– qui non c'è perché –) in Bologna available for all those who have not had the opportunity to see it at the theatre.

As the site is in the form of a blog, it will be open to guest commentaries and will develop into a forum for a discussion about contemporary music theatre.

 

open http://thereisnowhyhere.blog.rai.it

 


Photo © Opera Australia
Reviews of Il Turco in Italia in Sydney

Andrea Molino has conducted the premiere of Il Turco in Italia at the Sydney Opera House on January, 22, 2014. It was the Australian Premiere of Rossini's musical comedy.

"It is musically superb. The Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra under the wickedly delightful and exuberant conducting of maestro Andrea Molino is in fine form…", wrote the Sydney Arts Guide, and The Australian said that "Conductor Andrea Molino and the orchestra's brisk, rhythmically alert accompaniments complement the production's lightness of touch."

find more reviews

 


Photo © Opera Australia

Andrea Molino nominated for the 2014 Green Room Awards


Conductor Andrea Molino has been nominated under the Best Opera Conductor category of the 2014 Green Room Awards, Australia's premiere arts awards.

Established in 1983, the Green Room Awards honour outstanding talent in all areas of theatre and the stage in Australia, including musical theatre, opera, circus, alternative and hybrid, cabaret and dance, and reward achievement in performance, production and direction in these areas.

Molino has been nominated as Best Conductor for his season of The Masked Ball (Un Ballo in Maschera) with Opera Australia in 2013. Critics described this as 'a night to remember', and said of Molino that his 'thoroughly idiomatic reading of Verdi's score is electric, fully alert to the musical moments that prefigure later works like Don Carlo and Aida. His visceral interpretation packs a real dramatic punch yet he pulls back and supports his singers with sensitive rubato when required' (Clive Paget).

Competition for the award is fierce, with two Victoria Opera conductors also nominated: Daniel Carter for Magic Pudding, and Fabian Russel for Nixon in China. The winner will be decided through a secret ballot by a panel of judges, including performers, musicians, broadcasters and producers.

 


Photo © Opera Australia

Sydney Opera House – January 22, 2014
Andrea Molino conducts Rossini's Il Turco in Italia
Australian First Performance

 
"Take two long-lost lovers – a gypsy and a prince. Add a quarrelling couple – a free spirit and a fool. And add another secret lover, just for good measure." This is how the Opera Australia announces its latest opera production, Rossini's Il Turco in Italia (The Turk in Italy).

For the Australian First Performance of this tumultuous musical comedy, to be premiered on January 22, 2014, Andrea Molino will once more return to the Sydney Opera House where he has already conducted Verdi's Un ballo in maschera and Macbeth and the Australian Premiere of Carlisle Floyd's Of Mice and Men.

Under Molino's baton are the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra and a cast that includes Emma Matthews (Fiorilla), Luciano Botelho (Narciso), Conal Coad (Geronio), Paolo Bordogna (Selim), Samuel Dundas (Prosdocimo), Anna Dowsley (Zaida) and Graeme Macfarlane (Albazar).

The director is Simon Phillips, set and costumes are by Gabriela Tylesova and Nick Schlieper is the lighting designer.

The production is presented by Opera Australia in association with the Sydney Festival and will be performed in Italian with English surtitles.


Venue: Sydney Opera House, January 22, 25, 29, 31 and February 5, 12 at 7.30 p.m, February 8 at 1. p.m.


ECM publishes Sinan's Hasretim
DVD of the Dresden World Premiere conducted by Andrea Molino
Release on September 6, 2013



The renowned German CD label ECM publishes two full length (audio and DVD) performances of Marc Sinan's Hasretim – Journey to Anatolia. On the DVD, Andrea Molino conducts the Dresdner Sinfoniker for the World Premiere in Dresden (Festspielhaus Hellerau, October 9, 2010 – Festival Tonlagen), presented as a live video recording.

Molino also arranged and orchestrated the piece which is presented in a concert version from the Schleswig Holstein Musikfestival 2011 on the CD which completes the package.

Hasretim is a concert installation with video documents and Turkish folk music as well as the music of Turkish troubadours. The score is written for an ensemble of 22 instrumentalists, composed of members of the Dresdner Sinfoniker and Turkish and Armenian guest musicians. It is the result of an intense collaboration between Marc Sinan and Andrea Molino.

The last live performance, conducted by Andrea Molino, took place in the Berliner Philharmonie in March 2013 as part of the Berlin festival MaerzMusik.


more information
ECM
Trailer from the dvd

 

Kayhan Kalhor's Symphony for Palestine
Molino conducts 
Dresdner Sinfoniker on Tour in Palestine
May / June 2013 – East Jerusalem, Ramallah and Jenin


Andrea Molino conducts the Dresdner Sinfoniker on a tour to East Jerusalem, Ramallah and Jenin that is already attracting international attention. On the programme: the Symphony for Palestine by the Iranian composer and Kamancheh virtuoso Kayhan Kalhor.

The World Premiere of Kalhor's work, conducted by Andrea Molino, opened the festival Tonlagen at the Festspielhaus Hellerau in Dresden in October 2011. Since then, a tour to Jerusalem and the West Bank had been a cherished plan as the composition is dedicated to two Palestinians: Juliano Mer-Khamis, the murdered director of Jenin's Freedom Theatre, and the eleven-year old Ahmed Khatib, shot dead in 2005 by an Israeli soldier who mistook the boy's water pistol for an armed weapon, a story that went around the world because his parents donated Ahmed's organs to five Israeli children.

The composition combines classical Persian melodies and elements of Arabic folk music with the sound of a European string orchestra. The orchestral piece includes traditional oriental instruments such as Arabic violin (Kamil Shajrawi), Oud (Emil Bishara), Kamancheh (Mehri Asadullayeva), Darbuka (Naif Serhan) and Qanun (Nermin Hasanova).

Symphony for Palestine is sponsored by the ‘Kulturstiftung des Bundes' (the German federal Culture Foundation), the city of Dresden (department of culture and heritage), the ‘Kulturstiftung des Freistaates Sachsen' as well as the ‘Kulturstiftung Dresden der Dresdner Bank' and is a co-production of the Dresdner Sinfoniker and Ben Deiß.


Tour dates: Ramallah (Cultural Palace), May 30; Jerusalem (Al Hakawati Palestinian National Theatre), June 1; Jenin (Cinema Jenin), June 2 2013

more information
film with extracts

 


Copyright © Opera Australia

Molino conducts Verdi's A Masked Ball in Melbourne
Opera Australia's Production as a Live Cinema Event
 
 
Opera Australia's successful production of Verdi's A Masked Ball, conducted by Andrea Molino in a staging devised by La Fura dels Baus, went from Sydney to Melbourne in April and again met with enthusiastic critics. "Italian conductor Andrea Molino read an abundance of light and shade into the score," Gregory Pritchard wrote in ConcertoNet, and Lucy Graham in Stage Whispers spoke of Molino's "sensitive baton".
 
The production will be open to a far greater public soon as CinemaLive announces its transmission as an upcoming event.
CinemaLive is "a fully integrated solution that provides the entertainment industry with direct live access into cinema locations and big screens on a national and international basis".
  

Melbourne reviews
CinemaLive

 

  International Competition Music Theatre NOW?
Showcase with Molino's Three Mile Island
Jönköping, May 25 – Swedish Biennial for Performing Arts


As one of the winners of the international competition, Music Theatre NOW? Andrea Molino's multimedia staged concert Three Mile Island will be showcased during the Swedish Biennial for Performing Arts in Jönköping.

Music Theatre NOW is a worldwide competition for new Opera and Music Theatre organized by the International Theatre Institute and is one of the most important events for radical and experimental music theatre.

Molino's project was chosen together with 16 others by a jury made up of renowned theatre makers from five continents, from over 400 submissions, from more than 35 countries.

Three Mile Island , about the nuclear accident in Three Mile Island in 1979, is a co-production of ZKM - Centre for Arts and Media, Karlsruhe, Accademia Filarmonica Romana and Istituzione Universitaria dei Concerti, Rome, in cooperation with the Zurich University of the Arts. The project was first performed in Karlsruhe as part of the festival Europäische Kulturtage 2012, on March 29 in the ZKM. The production then went to Rome's Teatro India where the Italian premiere took place on May 21, 2012.

The project has also been nominated for the Prix Ars Electronica 2012.

Music Theatre NOW is organized by the ITI Music Theatre Committee, Teaterunionen - Swedish ITI/ Scenkonstbiennalen and the German ITI with financial support from Musikverket and the German ITI.


Venue: Jönköping, Stadsbiblioteket, May 25, 9.30-10.00 am 

 

The Possible Dwelling. Aesthetics, Architecture and New Media Molino participates with a testimony live from Jerusalem
Ravello, May 29, 19pm


An international conference organized by the University of Salerno and other important Italian institutions including the University "La Sapienza", Rome, will be held in Ravello in Oscar Niemeyer's beautiful auditorium. It will address the theme "Aesthetics, Architecture and New Media".

Andrea Molino will participate via live audiovisual connection from Jerusalem in the second session of the conference about "Metropolitan Senses" upon invitation of Prof. Pietro Montani of La Sapienza, Rome.


more information

 


Copyright ©
Opera Australia

Melbourne, State Theatre – April, 12
Molino conducts Opera Australia's Un Ballo in Maschera
 
 
Andrea Molino will conduct Verdi's Un Ballo in Maschera in Melbourne. Opera Australia's new production, premiered in January in Sydney, will be presented at the State Theatre in Melbourne's Arts Centre.
The international co-production with a staging devised by the legendary Catalan company La Fura dels Baus has been described as "a visually stunning, musically first-rate and dramatically provocative production" (Limelight).
The acclaimed soprano Csilla Boross and rising Mexican tenor Diego Torre make their Opera Australia role debuts as Amelia and Gustav III respectively, while the outstanding José Carbó portrays Count Anckarstroem in his first Verdi opera. Oscar is sung by Lorina Gore.
 
 
dates: April, 12, 17, 20, 26 and May 3 - 7:30 p.m.
venue: State Theatre in the Arts Center Melbourne

 

 

 

Molino makes his debut as a conductor at Berliner Philharmonie  Hasretim – Trip to Anatolia is part of the festival MaerzMusik
 
 
Andrea Molino has been invited by MaerzMusik, the important Berlin festival for contemporary music, to conduct once more Marc Sinan's Hasretim - Eine anatolische Reise. This will be Andrea's debut at the Berliner Philharmonie.
"Hasret" is the Turkish term for indefinable longing. Hasretim is a concert installation with video documents and music by the German Turkish musician Marc Sinan, arranged by Andrea Molino. It uses Turkish folk music as well as the music of Turkish troubadours. For the visual and musical material, Marc Sinan and Markus Rindt, manager of Dresden Symphony Orchestra (Dresdner Sinfoniker), looked for musical encounters in the easternmost regions of Turkey, close to the Armenian frontier.
Hasretim's first performance was conducted by Molino in Dresden in 2010. It was awarded the Special Prize of the YEAH! Young EARopean Award, by the German UNESCO Commission.
 
 
venue: March 20, 2013 – Berlin, Kammermusiksaal der Philharmonie
cast and more information
reviews of the first performance

 


Copyright © Alfons Flores
Reviews of Un Ballo in Maschera in Sydney
 
 
Andrea Molino has conducted the premiere of Verdi's Un Ballo in Maschera at the Sydney Opera House on January, 16. The event was part of Viva Verdi, Opera Australia's festival in celebration of Verdi's 200th anniversary.
"Molino's sense of style in this music is irresistible," the Sydney Morning Herald wrote, and Limelight said that "Andrea Molino's thoroughly idiomatic reading of Verdi's score is electric".
 

Find more reviews on Molino's homepage.
 
 

 

"Music is Theatre"
Andrea Molino portrayed in the ABC Classic FM Radio Program "Music Makers"


ABC Classical Radio presented Andrea Molino's work, both as a conductor and a composer, as part of its program "Music Makers".
Molino gave insights into his work with Opera Australia's production of Verdi's Un ballo di maschera at Sydney and Melbourne to presenter Mairi Nicolson. He discussed with her, opera, music theatre, his passion for contemporary music, and the importance of the visual component in his work. Excerpts of music chosen by Molino included works by: Verdi, Mozart, Bach, Stravinsky and Berio and were combined with Molino's own compositions, especially CREDO, his multimedia music theatre work first presented at the opening of the Queensland Biennial Music Festival in 2005.


First broadcast March 3, 2013, 12:05pm – listen again

 

Three Mile Island nominated for Prix Ars Electronica 2013
 
 
Molino's multimedia staged concert about the nuclear accident in Three Mile Island has been nominated for the Prix Ars Electronica 2013.
The award "...is our international trend barometer, constantly on the lookout for what's new & exciting, what's radically different, what's making an impact right now...," Ars Electronica says.
Three Mile Island was first performed in Karlsruhe as part of the festival "European Days of Culture" 2012 on March 29 in the ZKM. The original production then went to Rome's Teatro India where the Italian Premiere took place on May 21, 2012.
 
A documentary video of the World Premiere and reviews are available on Molino's homepage.

 

Sydney Opera House -– January 16, 2013
Andrea Molino conducts Verdi's Un Ballo in Maschera
World Premiere of a new production by La Fura dels Baus

Andrea Molino returns to the Sydney Opera House to conduct a new production of Verdi's Un Ballo in Maschera, which will have its premiere on January, 16.
Under Molino's baton is an exciting cast which includes the acclaimed soprano Tamar Iveri (Amelia) and rising Mexican tenor Diego Torre (Gustavo). José Carbó makes his Verdi debut (Count Anckarstroem), Oscar is sung by Taryn Fiebig.
The staging is devised by the legendary Catalan company La Fura dels Baus, with director Alex Ollé and designers Alfons Flores and Lluc Castells.
The Opera Australia production is presented in association with Sydney Festival 2013 and as part of Opera Australia's Verdi-Festival "Viva Verdi!", in celebration of Verdi's 200th Anniversary in 2013. It is co-produced by Teatro Colon, Buenos Aires; La Monnaie, Brussels; Norwegian National Opera & Ballet, Oslo.

Venue: Sydney Opera House
January 16, 19, 24 at 7.30pm, January 27 at 2pm
February 5, 8, 12 at 7:30 pm

 

International Theatre Institute
Molino's Three Mile Island wins the competition Music Theatre NOW

Andrea Molino's multimedia staged concert Three Mile Island is one of the winners of the international competition, Music Theatre NOW. A jury made up of renowned theatre makers from five continents had to choose from over 400 submissions from more than 35 countries.
The winning artistic teams will have the opportunity to showcase their work in the frame of the Swedish Biennial for Performing Arts in Jönköping in May 2013.
Molino's project, about the nuclear accident in Three Mile Island in 1979, is a co-production of ZKM – Centre for Arts and Media, Karlsruhe, Accademia Filarmonica Romana and Istituzione Universitaria dei Concerti, Rome, in cooperation with the Zurich University of the Arts. The project was first performed in Karlsruhe as part of the festival Europäische Kulturtage 2012, on March 29 in the ZKM. The production then went to Rome's Teatro India where the Italian premiere took place on May 21, 2012.

 

Festival "I Cantieri dell'Immaginario"
World Premiere of Andrea Molino's Open, Air
L'Aquila, Piazza del Teatro, 4.8.2012
 
 
Open, Air is the title of Andrea Molino's new site specific piece for orchestra, voices and instruments. The texts by Giorgio van Straten which include excerpts from Joseph Conrad and Robert Musil, deal with meteorology: the most typical topic of conversation when people gather together in open spaces. With one very relevant detail: the place of the World Premiere is the Piazza del Teatro in L'Aquila, the artistic Italian town almost completely destroyed by an earthquake in 2009.
 
Like the rest of the old town, the reconstruction of the Piazza is still far from being finished so the World Premiere is part of L'Aquila's festival
"I Cantieri dell'Immaginario". Its aim is to draw attention to the damaged historical centre of the town and to give the locations back to the citizens as meeting places, so that that they can again become core to the life of the community.
 
The Orchestra Sinfonica Abruzzese conducted by Carlo Boccadoro will play on a stage, a large vocal ensemble (approx. 60 people) and a percussion group of the Conservatorio de L'Aquila will be spread among the audience in the middle of the Piazza del Teatro. Other musicians will be placed in scaffoldings around the Piazza, erected for the reconstruction of the theatre, the church of San Bernardino and the Scuola De Amicis.
 
Open, Air is a commission of the Società Aquilana dei Concerti "B. Barattelli" for the year 2012.
 

Venue: 4.8.2012, 9:30 pm, L'Aquila, Piazza del Teatro

 

Andrea Molino: Three Mile Island
Documentary video
Reviews of the World Premiere and the Italian Premiere
Now available on Andrea Molino's homepage
 
 
Andrea Molino's multimedia staged concert about the nuclear accident in Three Mile Island in 1979 was first performed in Karlsruhe as part of the festival Europäische Kulturtage 2012 on March 29 in the ZKM. The original production then went to Rome's Teatro India where the Italian Premiere took place on May 21, 2012.
 
A documentary video of the World Premiere and reviews of the two performances are now available on Molino's homepage.
 
 
 

 

Three Mile Island
Italian Premiere of Molino's latest project
Rome, May 21, 2012



Following its World Premiere on March 29, 2012 in Karlsruhe, Andrea Molino's multimedia staged concert about the nuclear accident in Three Mile Island in 1979 will have its Italian Premiere (in its original production) in Rome's Teatro India.
 
The project is a co-production of the Centre for Arts And Media in Karlsruhe (ZKM), Accademia Filarmonica Romana, Istituzione Universitaria dei Concerti (IUC), Rome, in collaboration with Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) – Department of Art & Media, Klangforum Wien, Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart, and Teatro di Roma.
 

Andrea Molino will direct the Klangforum Wien and the Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart.
 
Prior to the event, Nobel Peace Laureate, Shirin Ebadi, will take part in a discussion entitled"La cortina di fumo" („the smoke curtain") about the issue of information regarding nuclear accidents.
Venue: May 21, 17.30 in the foyer of the theatre.
  
"There is no doubt that with Three Mile Island Andrea Molino has chosen a more than delicate subject to once again provide further proof that its substance is not literary fiction. But how the composer confronts this venture is testament to his integrity and honesty", a review wrote after the World Premiere. "Molino does not reduce the complexity of this highly technical theme, does not break it down to music, video or theatre, he takes all three by the horns and allows it to grow into its own hybrid."
 
 
Venue: Rome, Rome (Teatro India), May 21 and 22, 9 pm

more information
TV feature

 

FutureEverything Conference
Molino will discuss his
Three Mile Island project
Manchester, May 17, 2012
 
 
Andrea Molino is invited to present and discuss his multimedia staged concert Three Mile Islandat the FutureEverything Conference 2012 in Manchester.
 
The Conference is part of FutureEverything, an annual festival of art, music and ideas involving a mix of live events, exhibitions, workshops and talks in up to 30 different venues and spaces across Manchester.
 
Molino is not only the composer of the project about the nuclear accident in Three Mile Island in 1979 but has also conducted the World Premiere at Karlsruhe on March 29, 2012 as part of the European Days of Culture.
 
Venue: Manchester, May 17, 2012 (Museum of Science and Industry, 3.40pm, Room 2)

 

Claudio Ambrosini: Il Killer di Parole
Andrea Molino conducts French Premiere

Nancy, Opéra National de Lorraine, June 26, 2012
 
 
Claudio Ambrosini's Opera was first performed under the baton of Andrea Molino, at Teatro La Fenice on December 10, 2010. Il Killer di Parole is a co-production with Nancy's Opéra National de Lorraine where it will have its French Premiere on 26 June.
 
Il Killer di parole
(Le tueur de mots) is based on a libretto by the composer who wrote it following a series of conversations with his friend Daniel Pennac. The fascinating, unusual sounds, the elegant and intricate roles of the singers, the plot about an editor who fails in his tasks because of his fascination for the beauty and the charm of words and unusual languages, together with the cast of the World Premiere, directed by Franceso Micheli, made Ambrosini's opera a most successful production. It was awarded the 2010 prize for the best first performance of an opera by the prestigious music critics' Franco Abbiati Prize.
 
The restaging of the French Premiere brings the original cast to Nancy, accompanied by the Choeur de l'Opéra national de Lorraine and the Orchestre symphonique et lyrique de Nancy conducted by Andrea Molino.

Venue:  Nancy, Opéra National de Lorraine, June 26, 28. 29, July 1 and 3 (8 p.m., July 1: 3 pm)

more information
reviews

 

Andrea Molino: Three Mile Island
World Premiere of the multimedia staged concert
March 29, Karlsruhe, ZKMEuropäische Kulturtage 2012
 
 
With his new project Three Mile Island Andrea Molino undertakes to remind us of the nuclear accident that took place in Three Mile Island on the morning of the 28th March 1979, a tragedy that has been kept out of the limelight by a conspiracy of silence.? The Austrian meteorologist Ignaz Vergeiner found out that, in the first 24 crucial hours, the radioactive cloud travelled much further than the authorities admitted. The damage was serious and irreversible.

The multimedia staged concert with music by Molino is based on written and video-recorded contributions by Ignaz Vergeiner, collected by Karl Hoffmann. Guido Barbieri is responsible for the texts and dramaturgy. An interactive intermedial installation designed by a creative team from the Centre for Arts And Media in Karlsruhe (ZKM) and from the Department of Art & Media of the Zurich University of the Arts will react in real time with the live performers; the voice and face of Vergeiner; the testimonies of the survivors and the interviews with family members of the nuclear accident victims filmed on location.

This audiovisual material is continuously counterpointed by the Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart; the narration is reinforced and underlined by an extremely varied vocal texture. The instrumental element, performed by the Klangforum Wien, is also organically involved in this dialogue.

The project is a co-production of the Centre for Arts And Media in Karlsruhe (ZKM), Accademia Filarmonica Romana, Istituzione Universitaria dei Concerti (IUC), Rome, in collaboration with Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) – Department of Art & Media, Klangforum Wien, Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart, Teatro di Roma.
 
 
Venue
: Karlsruhe, ZKM, March 29, 30 and 31, 21pm
Tickets: +49 (0)721  81 00-12 00 or online
 
Italian Premiere: Rome (Teatro India), May 21, 2012?
 
 
more information
 

 

Waiblingen – December 4
Andrea Molino conducts Marc Sinan's HASRETIM
with the Dresdner Sinfoniker

 
 
After the successful first performance of Marc Sinan's HASRETIM – EINE ANATOLISCHE REISE in Dresden (Festival Tonlagen, October 9, 2010), Andrea Molino conducts the piece again with the Dresdner Sinfoniker in Waiblingen (Germany), in the series of events  "Hinaus in die Welt und herein mit ihr", an initiative focussing on the issue of integration.
 
Hasretim is a concert installation with video documents and Turkish folk music as well as the music of Turkish troubadours. Driven by hasret – the Turkish term for indefinable longing – the German Turkish musician Marc Sinan and Markus Rindt, manager of Dresden Symphony Orchestra (Dresdner Sinfoniker), looked for musical encounters in the easternmost outskirts of Turkey, close to the Armenian frontier. The score is written for an ensemble of 22 instrumentalists, composed of members of the Dresdner Sinfoniker and Turkish and Armenian musicians; it is the result of an intense collaboration between Marc Sinan and Andrea Molino.

Venue: Waiblingen, Bürgerzentrum (Ghibellinensaal) – 8 p.m.
Information and tickets

 

Venice, Gran Teatro La Fenice, Sale Apollinee – November 17
Molino conducts the World Premiere of Luis de Pablo's Números

 

Andrea Molino will conduct the Ex Novo Ensemble in a concert dedicated to the Spanish composer Luis de Pablo. On the programme is the World Premiere of Luis de Pablo's Números (2011), together with music by Liszt, Saint-Saëns, de Falla, Turina, and a second piece by de Pablo, Epístola al Transeùnte.
 
The concert is part of the 2011 edition of the festival Ex Novo Musica and is supported by the Fundacción BBVA.
 
Luis de Pablo, born in 1930 in Bilbao and living in Madrid, is one of those who opened up Spanish music to avant-garde aesthetics after the stagnancy of the Franco era. His aim was to unite his hispanidad with the cultural life of Europe. He participated at the Darmstadt courses, founded several organizations and organized contemporary music concert series. Today he is considered as one of the most important Spanish composers of our time.


Venue: Gran Teatro La Fenice, Venice (Sale Apollinee) – 8 p.m.
Tickets

Venue: Gran Teatro La Fenice, Venice (Sale Apollinee) – 8 p.m

Venice, Fondazione Cini – November 18
Festival Ex Novo Musica 2011


Andrea Molino participates in "Towards Darmstadt", a round table discussion with Luis De Pablo and Gabriele Bonomo, hosted by Mario Messinis, at the Sala Piccolo Teatro of the Fondazione Cini.

 

Press Reviews: Verdi's Macbeth at the Sydney Opera House
 
 
Andrea Molino recently conducted Verdi's Macbeth at the Sydney Opera House, it premiered on September 10, 2011. "As conductor, Molino's fidelity to Verdi and instinct for pace drove to the heart of the dramatic tension within scenes", said the Sydney Morning Herald. More reviews are now available on Molino's homepage.

 

Opening of the Festival Tonlagen
Andrea Molino conducts the World Premiere of Kalhor's
Cinema Jenin - A Symphony

Dresden, Festspielhaus Hellerau – October 1, 2011
 
 
On October 1, 2011 Andrea Molino conducts the Dresdner Sinfoniker for the World Premiere of a project about the Cinema Jenin, one of the major film theatres in Palestine, closed down in 1987 with the outbreak of the first Intifada but reopened in 2010 as a state-of-the-art cinema and cultural centre.
 
For this project, the internationally renowned Iranian composer and kamancheh player Kayhan Kalhor has written Cinema Jenin – A Symphony for four soloists (Kamil Shajrawi, oud; Ali Bahrami, santur; Sa'ad Mohamed Hassan, Arabian violin; Shane Shanahan, percussion) and orchestra. Extracts from the prize winning documentary film Cinema Jenin by Marcus Vetter will accompany the music.
 
Kalhor's composition opens the festival Tonlagen at the Festspielhaus Hellerau in Dresden. A tour will bring the project to Israel and the West Bank in spring 2012.
 
The second part of the evening is dedicated to Kayhan Kalhor's composition Silent City (2006) for kamancheh, percussion and string orchestra, a piece written for Yo-Yo Ma's Silk Road Ensemble and dedicated to cities destroyed by wars or natural catastrophes.
 
To complete the programme, Marcus Vetter's film Cinema Jenin can be seen before the concert (Festspielhaus, 6 p.m.).
 
Venue: Dresden, Festspielhaus Hellerau, October 1, 2011 - 8 p.m.

 

Sydney Opera House – September 10, 2011
Andrea Molino conducts Verdi's Macbeth
New production of Opera Australia  
 
 
After his recent debut at the Sydney Opera House with Carlisle Floyd's opera Of Mice and Men, Andrea Molino conducts the premiere of a new production of Verdi's Macbeth for Opera Australia on September 10, 2011.
  
For his first Macbeth, Molino works with the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra, the Opera Australia Chorus and a cast of remarkable singers. Peter Coleman-Wright (Macbeth) and Elizabeth Whitehouse (Lady Macbeth) will make their role debuts; Daniel Sumegi is Banquo and Rosario La Spina sings Macduff.
 
Sally Blackwood restudies the original staging by Canadian director Rene Richard Cyr, a co-production with the Opéra de Montréal. The set is designed by Claude Goyette, and François St-Aubin designs the costumes.
 
Venue: Sydney, Opera House
September 10, 15, 20, 23 and 27 / 7.30 p.m.

 

Carlisle Floyd: Of Mice and Men
Reviews of the Australian Premiere at the Sydney Opera House
 

 
Andrea Molino has conducted Carlisle Floyd's Of Mice and Men, a new production of the Opera Australia premiered at the Sydney Opera House on July 23, 2011 and broadcast by the Australian ABC Classic FM Radio.
 
Reviews of the event are now available on Molino's homepage.

 

Sydney Opera House – Saturday 23 July 7:30 p.m.
Andrea Molino makes his conducting debut at the Sydney Opera House

Australian Premiere of Carlisle Floyd's Of Mice and Men
 
Andrea Molino will make his debut at the Sydney Opera House with Opera Australia, for the Australian Premiere of Carlisle Floyd's Opera, Of Mice and Men. This will be a new production.
 
Molino will conduct the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra, the Opera Australia Chorus and a brilliant cast which includes Anthony Dean Griffey as Lennie; Barry Ryan as George; Bradley Daley as Curley and Jacqueline Mabardi as Curley's wife. The production is directed by the celebrated film director Bruce Beresford.

In its blog, Opera Australia follows the making of this opera production.
 
Carlisle Floyd is one of America's most revered composers, writing in the tradition of Aaron Copland and Samuel Barber. His highly theatrical music is full of humanity, underscored by a richly nuanced orchestral sound.
 
Of Mice and Men is based on John Steinbeck's 1937 novella and shows a rural California in the time of the Great Depression. George and Lennie, two migrant farmhands, are different from their fellow workers. They have a plan, a dream to buy a farm and make a life. But it will only ever happen if George can keep Lennie, who has the strength of a giant, but the mind of a child, out of trouble.
 
Venue: Sydney, Opera Theatre – July 23, 26, 29 and August 2, 5, and 11, 7:30 p.m.