Les Arts premieres ‘Cendrillon’, by Pauline Viardot, its first new operatic production in 2023

'Les Arts és Òpera'

Les Arts premieres 'Cendrillon', by Pauline Viardot, its first new operatic production in 2023

• Joan Font proposes a fun and lighthearted adaptation of the opera that the legendary artist of Spanish origin composed based on Perrault's story
• Following the season opener with the contemporary work 'Zelle' by the British-Chinese composer Jamie Man, the Centre de Perfeccionament premieres its second work composed by a woman 

Valencia (07.02.23). Les Arts premieres, on Thursday, February 9, 'Cendrillon', by Pauline Viardot, the first new operatic production of 2023, with stage direction by Joan Font and featuring artists from the Centre de Perfeccionament del Palau de les Arts as the main protagonists.

The artistic director of Les Arts, Jesús Iglesias Noriega, presented this title today at a press conference, accompanied by the stage director of the production, Joan Font, and the musical advisor of the Centre de Perfeccionament, María Bayo.

Iglesias Noriega has emphasized the important commitment that introducing Viardot's salon opera represents for the theater, for which he has given Joan Font "absolute carte blanche".

According to Iglesias Noriega, the director and founder of 'Comediants' has developed a new dramaturgy, with more agile and popular dialogues, and which includes musical numbers not part of the score, in a nod to the variety show, combined with the renowned talent of the Catalan to turn the work "into an authentic show".

To do this, Font creates a preliminary framework for staging the work and introduces the characters, including the pianist, as workers from a moving company who, upon discovering Viardot's score, decide to perform it.

Likewise, Jesús Iglesias Noriega has framed the choice of the work as a vindication of the essential figure of Pauline Viardot, daughter of the legendary Spanish singer, teacher and composer Manuel García, whose 'Un avvertimento ai gelosi' premiered at Les Arts last year.

“The sister of the legendary Maria Malibran is one of the most fascinating women of the past century: a performer with a prodigious voice and an enigmatic and mysterious personality, as well as being attractive and captivating.”

“Cosmopolitan, multifaceted, enterprising and of exquisite culture, she was a composer, singer, pianist, singing teacher and her biography intersects with some of the most relevant figures of the time: Gioachino Rossini, Frédéric Chopin, George Sand, Ferenc Liszt, Richard Wagner, Clara Schumann, Johannes Brahms or Camille Saint-Saëns,” Iglesias Noriega indicated.

In an operatic course that the Centre de Perfeccionament began with the premiere of the contemporary 'Zelle', by the British-Chinese Jamie Man, the vision of another pioneering woman in her time, the 'Cendrillon', by Viardot, completes the training commitment of the artists this year.

The current promotion of the Center de Perfectionament stars in this title: Rosa Dávila ('Cendrillon'), Mariana Sofia ('Armelinde'), Iria Goti ('Maguelone'), Pilar Garrido ('La Fée'), Marcelo Solís ('Le Baron de Pictordu'), Maximiliano Spósito ('Le Comte Barigoule') and the pianist Ignacio Aparisi. The Valencian tenor Álvaro Diana plays the role of Le Prince Charmant.

The production features set design by Manuel Zuriaga, costumes by José María Adame, and lighting by Nadia García. After its run at the Teatre Martín i Soler, 'Cendrillon', in its Valencian adaptation, 'La Ventafocs', will tour the municipalities of the Valencian Community starting in June with the Les Arts Volant truck.

The Teatre Martín i Soler will host three performances of the play open to the general public on February 9, 16, and 18, along with one performance reserved exclusively for participants in the educational program 'Les Arts és Educació'. Tickets for 'Cendrillon' are priced at a single rate of 30 euros.

'Cendrillon'

'Cendrillon' is the last work by Pauline Viardot, premiered in 1904, just six years before her death. The librettist also based it on Perrault's 'Cinderella', but introduced some modifications to the tale. Among them, Cinderella doesn't have a stepmother, but she does have a somewhat deceitful father, the Baron de Pictordu, who denies his true daughter, and her stepsisters Maguelone and Armelinde are selfish, but not unpleasant.

Musically, Viardot's opera is a mirror of his friendships and aesthetic experiences. It is not difficult to recognize phrases dedicated to Massenet or Gounod; measures infused with the spirit of Wagner and, above all, of his beloved Chopin. Beyond that, the essence of French escapist opera, which had gained strength in Paris during the second half of the 19th century with Offenbach, permeates the spirit of Cendrillon: operetta, vaudeville, and opéra-comique had radiated their contagious influence to these escapist opera houses.

In 'Cendrillon', Viardot employs the cuplé of French operetta and vaudeville, at a historical moment when the cuplé was emerging in Spain as a form of musical entertainment. In this sense, the inclusion in the show of music taken from the vast repertoire generated in Spain between 1900 and the Civil War—primarily in Madrid, Barcelona, and Valencia—reflects a reality: the creation of a new dramatic-musical repertoire based on the blending of traditional models from the género chico and the zarzuela grande with rhythms imported from France.