At the Maggio Fiorentino Festival, “A Masked Ball” in the Time of John Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe

After the inauguration entrusted to the contemporary melodrama The Death of Klinghoffer, the’88th Maggio Musicale Fiorentino Festival continues its operatic program with a new production of A masked ball of Giuseppe Verdi, on stage since May 12-24, 2026 for a total of five performances. The opera, last performed in 2020 as a concert at the Cavea, returns to the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino with a stage production, more than thirty years after its last production in 1995.

He makes his debut on the podium of the Orchestra and Choir of the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino Emmanuel Tjeknavorian, at his first ever operatic direction. The direction is entrusted to Valentina Carrasco, with scenes by Andrea Belli, costumes of Silvia Aymonino, lights of Marco Filibeck and videos curated by Massimo Volpini.

The singing company sees Riccardo alternate in the role Antonio Poli is Max Jota (in the performance of May 22nd), while Renato is played by Bogdan Baciu is Hae Kang (in the performances of May 15th and 22nd). The roles of Amelia are alternated Chiara Isotton is Alessia Panza (May 22), next to Lavinia Bini in the role of Oscar. Completing the cast Ksenia Dudnikova (Ulrica), Janusz Nosek (Silvano), Mattia Denti (Samuel), Adriano Gramigni (Tom), in addition to Francis Congiu is Roberto Miani, respectively A judge and A servant of Amelia.

Speaking of Verdi's masterpiece, Emmanuel Tjeknavorian He emphasized the opera's dramatic and musical complexity, highlighting its constant interplay of contrasts: “There are operas that reveal themselves slowly, and others that seem to speak to us immediately from the very first moment. Un ballo in maschera is both: at first glance, it can appear almost light, as if devoid of gravity. But the more you study it, listen to it, experience it, the more what lies beneath the surface emerges—something more complex and different. It is precisely this duality that strikes me. On the one hand, elegance, brilliance, and a natural fluidity of the musical discourse; on the other, a constant fragility and the perception that everything can crumble at any moment. All the characters inhabit this tension. Musically, it means accepting that opera never follows a single direction. The contrasts remain alive, and light does not dissolve darkness, but makes it visible. Often, it is precisely from lightness that something deeper emerges. As a conductor, I try to approach this music as if everything were happening in the moment, while still sensing the direction it is tending toward.”.

The new production bears the signature of Valentina Carrasco, who made her debut at the Maggio in 2007 as a co-director on the historical Das Rheingold. For this production, the director chooses to set the story in the early 1960s in America, during the Kennedy administration, a period marked by profound political and social tensions. The original structure of this masterpiece revolves around the story of a great, charismatic and popular leader, who nevertheless had enemies within his own circle. This reminded me of a well-known episode in recent history: the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Since the version chosen is the most common one, in which the libretto's action is moved to the North American colonies and the King of Sweden is transformed, originally for reasons of expediency and censorship, into the British governor Richard, I found it interesting to draw a parallel with John F. Kennedy. Certain aspects of his private and political life seemed particularly relevant to me, as well as, of course, his death at the hands of an assassin: the result of a conspiracy whose details are still—in part—unclear. Richard, the Earl of Warwick, also presents us with his well-known qualities, but also with evident flaws and a series of questionable behaviors: he himself is aware of betraying the trust of a friend and political ally for sentimental reasons.