FULL DON BUONPARTE (Alberto Franchetti) Annaberg-Buchholz 2023 László Varga, Maria Rüssel, Bettina Grothkopf, Sophia Keiler

Information on the Performance

• Work Title: Don Buonaparte or Don Bonaparte  
• Composer: Franchetti Alberto  
• Libretto: Giovacchino Forzano    Libretto Text, Libretto Index
• Venue & Opera Company: Erzgebirgische Theater in Annaberg-Buchholz, Germany  
• Recorded: Oktober 2023
• Type: Staged Opera Live
• Singers: László Varga, Maria Rüssel, Bettina Grothkopf, Sophia Keiler, Jinsei Park, Kerem Kurk, Corentin Backès, Richard Glöckner, Jakob Hoffmann, Volker Tancke, Lukáš Šimonov, Yuta Kimura, Richard Glöckner, Jakob Hoffmann
• Conductor: Jens Georg Bachmann  
• Orchestra: birgische Philharmonie Aue  
• Chorus: Opernchor und Extrachor des Eduard-von-Winterstein-Theaters  
• Chorus Master: Daniele Pilato  
• Stage Director: Lev Pugliese  
• Stage Designer: Lev Pugliese  
• Costume Designer:   

Information about the Recording

• Published by: Roberto Job  
• Date Published: 2026  
• Format: Streaming
• Quality Video: 4 Audio:4
• Subtitles: yessubs, itsubs, gensubs  

• ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON THIS PERFORMANCE

  SYNOPSIS

  The action takes place in a small village near Certaldo a few months before Napoleon Bonaparte’s coronation as emperor.

  In a small Tuscan village, while preparations are underway for Mattea and Maso’s engagement party, while simultaneously celebrating the results of an exceptional harvest and competing to see who has produced the most fiascos, a platoon of Napoleon’s army arrives, searching for the local parish priest, Don Bonaparte.
  The news the general must deliver comes directly from the future emperor, concerning the conferral of the cardinal’s purple on his elderly uncle, the parish priest. Don Bonaparte must pack his bags, travel to Rome for the investiture, and then to Paris, as a cardinal, for Napoleon’s coronation. The carriage and horses are already ready for departure, but the parish priest, excited and confused by such an important decision, asks for two days’ grace.
  The news sparks a genuine revolution in the small village: some claim rights to follow the priest, while others dream of Paris and social redemption. There are even those—a lawyer, a friar, a knight (symbols of the three most important state institutions)—who demand huge favors and illegal benefits for their own personal interests and business, not hesitating to invoke corruption as a matter of course, so to speak. The names of two of the three allude, with bitter mockery, to their inherent dishonest nature.
  The tranquility of the small town is now irremediably disturbed; everyone seems to have gone mad, and even the love affair between Mattea and Maso encounters unexpected obstacles, or rather, it brings to fruition the initial hesitations of a young woman longing for broader prospects beyond the limited horizons of the small town. Love at first sight between her and the corporal ignites a story of farcical and licentious nuances, culminating in a providential shotgun wedding.
  The opera concludes with the decision, unexpected by all: Don Bonaparte will leave neither for Rome nor for Paris. General amazement, but also a calming of spirits in the return to normality with the exaltation of small peasant virtues.

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