Teatro alla Scala, Milan

We went last night to La Scala to see Il barbiere di Siviglia by Gioachino Rossini. The cast included Juan Diego Florez as Count Almaviva, Alessandro Corbelli as Dr. Bartolo, Joyce Didonato as Rosina and Franco Vassallo as Figaro.

Beautiful, clear voices for a light opera. The conductor was a young fellow Michele Mariotti, the production is 40 years old and was a creation of Jean-Pierre Ponnelle.
Will remembered it from seeing this production many moons ago.

One great scene is when Basilio, a priest, a role sung by Alexander Tsymbalyuk, explains to Bartolo how they will get rid of Lindoro aka Count Almaviva, is shadow on the back drop grows and grows and becomes comical and terrifying all at once. Finally Bartolo takes away the oil lamps so the shadow will go away, so afraid he is of it.
At one point the show stopped after an aria by Juan Diego Flores who received 5 minutes of thunderous applause by the audience who were demanding an encore. La Scala theatre has been completely rebuilt, it is very beautiful to look at.

Ballroom, bar area

La Scala auditorium

We went to a little café called Il Salotto in the Galleria Vittotio Emanuelle II after the show, the food was quite good, very nice waiters, we had a Risoto Milanese, saffron and chicken stock and a Milanese veal cotelette (chop) not the usual scaloppini, lightly breaded and fried, very good.

We slept very well, tired as we were, it had been a long day but what fun. I have to say that all these years traveling with Mr. Will is always fun, he knows how to make a trip interesting.