The Palau de les Arts hosts rehearsals for Verdi's La Traviata, the opening opera of the 2013-2014 Season

The soprano Sonya Yoncheva (Violetta Valéry), the tenor Ivan Magrì (Alfredo Germont) and the baritone Simone Piazzola (Giorgio Germont) head the cast

The arts center presents the production of La Traviata in Valencia with which stage director Willy Decker achieved resounding success at the 2005 Salzburg Festival.

Valencia. The Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía is hosting rehearsals for La Traviata by Giuseppe Verdi, an opera that will inaugurate the 2013-2014 season of the Valencian arts center on October 19, under the musical direction of Zubin Mehta.

Stage director Meisje Barbara Hummel is immersed in the work for the premiere of this work, which is presented in Valencia in a production by De Nederlandse Opera de Amsterdam based on the staging by the German Willy Decker for the Salzburg Festival.

The German director achieved one of the greatest successes of his career with this production of La Traviata . His elegant and minimalist staging of Verdi's classic, with Anna Netrebko and Rolando Villazón in the leading roles and Carlo Rizzi conducting, was the sensation of the 2005 edition of the prestigious opera festival.

Decker's vision focuses all attention on the figure and fate of the courtesan Violetta Valéry, whose love and subsequent sacrifice for the bourgeois Alfredo Germont at the behest of the pressures of his father Giorgio Germont lead her to a dramatic agony.

As the director himself explained, his production strips the scene of all historical elements to avoid any barrier between the viewer and the heroine. “Verdi wanted to create a work with a woman as the protagonist, a contemporary heroine far removed from operatic standards. It is obvious that he is clearly on her side and pursues her throughout the opera like an obsessive lover.”

“By setting the drama in the mid-19th century, something that became customary in the previous century, the present becomes the past, and if there is something crucial in this work it is that Violetta is someone familiar to us,” Willy Decker pointed out.

The production, with set design by Wolfgang Gussmann, costumes by Wolfgang Gussmann and Susana Mendoza, lighting by Hans Toelstede and choreography by Athol John Farmer, has subsequently been performed at the Amsterdam Opera and the Metropolitan Opera in New York.

Soprano Sonya Yoncheva (Violetta Valéry), winner of Operalia 2010 in Milan, leads the cast. The Bulgarian singer recently performed this role in Monte Carlo and has engagements to do so in Vienna, London, and San Francisco. She has also worked at other leading opera houses such as London's Covent Garden and the Paris Opera, and has projects on her schedule with the Metropolitan Opera in New York, La Monnaie in Brussels, and the Deutsche Oper Berlin.

Winner of numerous opera competitions, Ivan Magrì (Alfredo Germont) has studied with Luciano Pavarotti. With extensive experience in the Italian repertoire, he has sung Verdi's operas Rigoletto and I due Foscari at the Palau de les Arts. In March 2014, he will return to Valencia to perform the role of Gabriele Adorno in Verdi's Simon Boccanegra , alongside Plácido Domingo.

Baritone Simone Piazzola completes the leading trio as Giorgio Germont. Since his debut at La Fenice in Venice in 2008, the Veronese singer has enjoyed a rising career, performing at Italy's major opera houses. His résumé includes collaborations with artists such as Plácido Domingo, Riccardo Muti, and Robert Carsen.

Presence of artists from the Plácido Domingo Perfection Center

The artists from the Centre de Perfeccionament Plácido Domingo are taking on most of the supporting roles in La Traviata . For the first time, a total of seven current and former students of this program are participating in a production in the Main Hall.

The members of the current promotion, Maria Kosenkova (Flora Bervoix), Cristina Alunno (Annina), Valentino Buzza (Giuseppe), David Astorga (Flora's servant) and Germán Olvera (Messenger), join Mario Cerdá (Gastone) and Mattia Olivieri (a gentleman).

The cast of the production is completed by Javier Franco (Baron Douphol), Maurizio Lo Piccolo (Marquis D'Obigny) and Luigi Roni (Doctor Grenvil).

Seven performances of La Traviata

The Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía has scheduled a total of seven performances of La Traviata . In addition to the premiere on October 19, the opera will also be performed on the 24th and 29th of this month, as well as on November 2, 7, 10, and 13.

Although its premiere at La Fenice in Venice in 1853 was a resounding failure, the passage of years has placed this Verdi opera, with a libretto by Francesco Maria Piave based on La dama de las camelias by Alexandre Dumas (son), among the most performed and most accepted titles in the operatic repertoire.

Many of its passages, such as the overture, the toast scene (“ Libiamo ne lieti calici ”), the cabaletta “ Sempre Libera ” or the aria “ Addio del passato ”, have become part of popular musical culture.

This is only the second time the Valencian arts center has programmed this opera in its history. La Traviata closed the 2009-2010 season in April, conducted by Lorin Maazel and directed by the German director Henning Brockhaus.