FULL GINA (Cilea) Reggio Calabria 2025 Domenico Cagliuso, Roberta Pannuccio, Luisa Umbacca

Information on the Performance

• Work Title: GINA  
• Composer: Cilea Francesco  
• Libretto:  Libretto Text, Libretto Index
• Venue & Opera Company: Conservatorio di Musica "F. Cilea" di Reggio Calabria  
• Recorded: February 28, 2025
• Type: Staged Opera Live
• Singers: Domenico Cagliuso, Roberta Pannuccio, Luisa Umbacca, Davide Fazzari, Angelo Michele MAZZA
• Conductor: Milo LONGO  
• Orchestra: ORCHESTRA DEL CONSERVATORIO "F. CILEA"  
• Chorus: Coro del Conservatorio "F. Cilea", Coro lirico "F. Cilea":  
• Chorus Master: Vincenzo Luca MORO, Bruno TIROTTA  
• Stage Director: Mario DE CARLO  
• Costume Designer: Sartoria teatrale BIANCHI (Milano)  
• Lighting Designer: Domenico SANTACROCE  

Information about the Recording

• Published by: Conservatorio F. Cilea di Reggio Calabria-Official  
• Date Published: 2025  
• Format: Streaming
• Quality Video: 4 Audio:4
• Subtitles: yessubs, itsubs, gensubs  

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON THIS PERFORMANCE

Gina is an opera in three acts by Francesco Cilea with a libretto by Enrico Golisciani . It was performed for the first time on 9 February 1889 in the theatre of the Conservatory of San Pietro a Majella in Naples .

This is the work that Cilea composed as a final essay for his course of studies. The first performance was a great success, but the opera was never revived. The first modern performance took place at the Teatro Rendano in Cosenza in November 2000 , and the show was also revived in Rome the following year ; a recording was released on the Bongiovanni label from this performance. In 2017 the opera was staged at the Teatro Malibran in Venice . In the same year the Introductory Chorus of the opera was found, performed for the first time in a production of the opera in Reggio Calabria, on 28 February 2025, by the “F. Cilea” Conservatory of Music of Reggio Calabria , at the Teatro Cilea in Reggio Calabria.

Plot
The opera, set in France at the beginning of the 19th century, during the Napoleonic Wars (the libretto contains a reference to the Battle of Jena and the Russian campaign, as well as several mentions of the “Imperator”), tells the story of the love between Gina and Giulio with a happy ending. Giulio offers to replace Uberto, Gina’s brother, in military service. Gina, even without having met him personally, promises him love. When Giulio returns, years later, he no longer has with him the ring that Gina had given him as a pledge, but the love between the two triumphs anyway thanks to the intervention of Flamberge, Giulio’s comrade in arms, who brings with him the ring lost by his friend.

In homage to Francesco Cilea in the 60th Academic Year of the Conservatory of Reggio Calabria, a project was created that largely involved students, teachers and administrative staff of the institution named after him. The performance of the first opera by the maestro from Palma, “Gina”, complete with the introductory chorus for the first time, fully fulfills the duty of an educational and research institution such as the conservatory to make known even secondary and little-known works. It was thanks to “Gina” that Cilea was noticed by the publisher Sonzogno who published his subsequent works.
The task of recovering and transcribing the initial chorus of “Gina”, lost but fortunately rediscovered in the library of the Neapolitan Conservatory by the musicologist Giancosimo Russo in 2017, was entrusted by the director Francesco Romano to Salvatore Esposito Ferraioli, professor of History of Music. Subsequently, the Choir was revised by the student composer Rocco Catania and the score of “Gina” was taken over by Milo Longo, a teacher who had already directed some valuable opera performances of the Conservatory held at the Teatro sullo Stretto in the past two years. The students then began, in their respective classes, the study of the opera, which at first was planned to be performed only in concert form due to the considerable cost of staging.
The choice to invite Mario De Carlo, an internationally renowned director from Reggio, allowed this staging of “Gina” because he immediately generously shared the initiative for the benefit of the most complete training possible in the name of full valorization of local talents.

(Visited 225 times, 1 visits today)