A WORLD PREMIERE, A RARITY AND A BRILLIANT THEATRICAL VIS
FOR THE 12TH EDITION OF THE FESTIVAL DEDICATED TO THE BERGAMASQUE COMPOSER

At the Donizetti Theater The Exile from Rome and Le convenienze ed inconvenienze teatrali and at the Teatro Sociale Alahor in Granata presented in the new critical edition of the autograph score found in Palermo in 2023

On the podium Antonino Fogliani, Chiara Cattani and Alberto Zanardi;
Directed by Katharina Thoma, Benedetto Sicca and Silvia Paoli.
In the principal roles Lidia Fridman, Sergey Romanovsky, Luca Pisaroni, Grisha Martirosyan, Dave Monaco, Mira Alkhovik, Laura Verrecchia and Paolo Bordogna

The 2026 edition of the Donizetti Opera is dedicated to the memory of Gianandrea Gavazzeni, on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of his death, after whom a Gala at the Donizetti Theater and a documentary exhibition spread throughout the city will be named

Completing the program are three Under 30 Previews, the rich Donizetti OFF schedule and the Opera Family proposals

Bergamo, November 13 to 29, 2026

Tickets on sale from March 25

 

A program entirely focused on Donizetti rarities and little-performed titles, in addition to the rich Donizetti Off schedule with the celebration of the 30th anniversary of the death of Bergamo conductor Gianandrea Gavazzeni at its center: this is the 12th edition of Donizetti Opera, the second with Riccardo Frizza in the dual role of artistic and musical director. The international festival dedicated to the famous composer from Bergamo, organized by the Donizetti Theater Foundation of Bergamo chaired by Giorgio Berta with the general direction of Massimo Boffelli, with the support of the City of Bergamo, will animate the theaters of the City of Gaetano Donizetti from November 13 to 29, 2026, the day of the dies natalis Donizetti. The Donizetti Opera is made possible thanks to the support of Allianz ( Main Partner of the Donizetti Theater Foundation), Intesa Sanpaolo, SIAD, ATB Mobility, A2A, Sacbo, Uniacque, Fondazione Cariplo, and to a growing number of partner companies and realities adhering to the Donizetti Ambassadors project that support the festival through Art Bonus.

“The Donizetti Opera 2026 – declares. Riccardo Frizza – carries with it a deep meaning and at the same time an open look at the world. We wanted to dedicate this edition of the festival to the memory of Gianandrea Gavazzeni, on the 30th anniversary of his death: a fitting tribute to a figure who indelibly marked the musical history of Bergamo and the entire international opera scene. It was Gavazzeni, with his extraordinary artistic vision and intellectual rigor, who gave decisive impetus to what we now call the “Donizetti Renaissance,” restoring dignity and centrality to a composer that history had long neglected. Without him, this festival would probably not exist.

This dedication is accompanied by a billboard of high-profile international: artists from all over the world will bring different voices and sensibilities to our stages, confirming Donizetti Opera’s vocation to be a reference point for bel canto globally. Many debuts at the festival: from the director of the Rome exile Katharina Thoma on tenor Sergey Romanovsky, among the leads in the same title, to baritone Grisha Martirosyan who will be Alahor and soprano Mira Alkhovik – making her debut in Italy – as Zobeida. Internationalization, however, comes not only from the artists’ country of origin, but above all from their value recognized worldwide: Antonino Fogliani returns to Bergamo to take the podium of the Orchestra Donizetti Opera, while we will witness the Bergamo premiere of bass-baritone Luca Pisaroni. Among the welcome returns are tenor Dave Monaco, a prize-winner at the last Operalia competition, and bass-baritone Paolo Bordogna, who will mentor in rehearsals and on stage the Bottega Donizetti’s students in The theatrical conveniences and inconveniences .. In fact, our commitment to the younger generation remains central: the Bottega Donizetti continues to be the main project for training young artists capable of tackling the Donizetti repertoire with awareness and talent. Last year the success of the selected voices was unanimously recognized by audiences and critics alike: continuing on this path is, therefore, not only an artistic choice but a responsibility toward the future.

Also confirmed to be engaged in the festival are the orchestral ensembles Donizetti Opera e The Originalsas well as the consolidated participation of the Chorus of the Accademia Teatro alla Scala.

Finally, the successful collaboration with Opera Rara, a British institution with which we share the mission of bringing to light forgotten pages of Donizetti’s catalog and presenting the complete performance of Donizetti’s romanze: a work of research and enhancement that bears new, precious fruit every year.”

Donizetti Opera 2026 presents, for three consecutive weekends, three new stagings: at the Donizetti Theatre will be staged L’esule di Roma (Friday, Nov. 13, Saturday, Nov. 21 and Sunday, Nov. 29) and The theatrical conveniences and inconveniences. (Sunday, Nov. 15, Friday, Nov. 20 and Saturday, Nov. 28); at the Teatro Sociale, in the Upper Town, will be presented Alahor in Granada (Saturday, Nov. 14, Sunday, Nov. 22 and Friday, Nov. 27). Each work is preceded by a’ Under 30 Preview (Tuesday, Nov. 10, Wednesday, Nov. 11 and Thursday, Nov. 12), which, as per tradition, will involve hundreds of young people who will have the opportunity to be the first to see the festival’s new productions at a special price.

The philological work on the works chosen for the 2026 edition was supervised by the Donizetti Theater Foundation Study Center directed by Paolo Fabbri, which helped identify the critical editions of the scores published by Casa Ricordi, made with the contribution and collaboration of the Bergamo Foundation.

 

The exile from Rome

He will open the festival, Friday, Nov. 13, 8 p.m. at the Donizetti Theater (with repeats on Saturday, Nov. 21, 8 p.m. and Sunday, Nov. 29, 3:30 p.m.), the heroic melodrama in two acts L’esule di Roma, composed by Gaetano Donizetti to a libretto by Domenico Gilardoni for the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples, where it was staged on January 1, 1828. The critical edition is edited by Roger Parker and Ian Schofield for Casa Ricordi, with the collaboration and contribution of the Fondazione Teatro Donizetti of Bergamo.

The action takes place in imperial Rome in the time of Tiberius: the general Publius, having returned victorious from his campaign against the Sarmatians, finds himself embroiled in a story of betrayal and nobility of spirit that revolves around the love between Argelia and the tribune Septimius, who was unjustly exiled by her father, Murena. Through remorse, redemption and courage, the story resolves in a happy ending that restores justice to all the characters.

The new set-up features. Antonino Fogliani, a conductor with an international profile, at the helm of theDonizetti Opera Orchestra. It is directed by German creative Katharina Thoma, making his debut in Italy and who has signed productions at the Glyndebourne Festival, the Royal Opera House in London and major European theaters (Frankfurt, Cologne, Leipzig, Malmo) and is head of the stage art department at the Hochschule für Musik in Wurzburg. Both are at their debut at the Donizetti Opera. The creative team includes scenes from Devin McDonough, costumes by Irina Bartels, lighting by Fiammetta Baldiserri and videos by Luca Scarzella, with dramaturgy curated by Thoma herself.

Prominent in the leading roles are soprano Lidia Fridman (Argelia), tenor Sergey Romanovsky (Septimius), bass-baritone Luca Pisaroni (Murena) and mezzo-soprano Vittoria Vimercati (Leontina), with the Chorus of the Accademia Teatro alla Scala prepared by Salvo Sgrò.

 

Alahor in Garnet

An absolute opportunity for rediscovery, the project title will be staged at the Social Theater #donizetti200: Alahor in Granata, an opera composed by Donizetti exactly two hundred years ago, in 1826, for the Teatro Carolino in Palermo, which debuts at the festival Saturday, November 14 at 8 p.m. (then repeated on Sunday, Nov. 22, 3:30 p.m. and Friday, Nov. 27, 8 p.m.). The two-act melodrama to a libretto by M. A. is offered in the new critical edition edited by Edoardo Cavalli for the Fondazione Teatro Donizetti, compiled following the identification of the autograph score at the library of the Conservatorio “A. Scarlatti” in Palermo, which took place in 2023.

In Bergamo, the opera will be performed for the first time in modern times as Donizetti conceived it in 1826: the 1998 revival at Seville’s Teatro de la Maestranza and the 1999 revival at Palermo’s Teatro Massimo were, in fact, based on the score of the 1830 staging, a later version. The story, set in late 15th-century Granada, weaves the story of the incognito return of Alahor, brother of Zobeida, both sons of the assassinated king Mohamed, with the plots of power and love between the warring factions of Abenceraghi and Zegri, in a whirlwind of revenge, magnanimity and redemption.

As explained by Paolo Fabbri, scientific director of the Centro Studi Donizettiani: “Gaetano Donizetti spent a long period working in Palermo, at the Teatro Carolino, from April 1825 to February 1826. Cavalli’s discovery has made it possible to have a fully reliable score of what Donizetti wrote in 1826 and, a few years later, we are already able to propose to the public the result of the scientific research carried out by the Centro Studi Donizettiani.”

The musical direction is entrusted to Chiara Cattani, a specialist in philological performances on historical instruments and music director of the Accademia Montis Regalis, for the first time leading theOrchestra Gli Originali, a formation that adopts period instruments. The direction is signed by Benedetto Sicca, making his festival debut, with sets by Luigi Ferrigno, costumes by Marco Piemontese and lighting by Marco Giusti.

In the principal roles the baritone Grisha Martirosyan (Alahor), tenor Dave Monaco (Alamar), soprano Mira Alkhovik (Zobeida), mezzo-soprano Laura Verrecchia (Muley-Hassem) and soprano Cristina De Carolis (Sulima), a talent of Bottega Donizetti 2025, along with the Chorus of the Accademia Teatro alla Scala.

 

The theatrical conveniences and inconveniences.

Closing the triptych is the dramma giocoso Le convenienze ed inconvenienze teatrali, at the Donizetti Theater Sunday, November 15, 3:30 p.m. (Runs: Friday, Nov. 20, 8 p.m. and Saturday, Nov. 28, 8 p.m.). The opera, on a libretto by Domenico Gilardoni, was composed by Donizetti for the Teatro Nuovo in Naples in 1827, enlarged in Milan in 1831 and then reworked again for the staging at the Teatro del Fondo in Naples on September 26 of the same year; it is in this last version, the most accomplished, that it will be offered at the festival, in the critical edition edited by Roger Parker and Anders Wiklund for Casa Ricordi.

An irresistible farce set amid rehearsals for a melodrama in a provincial little theater: wayward prima donnas, a poetish librettist, a mediocre composer, meddlesome husbands and meddlesome mothers vie for the stage in a whirlwind of bickering and pretension. An opera that, with unfailing humor, lays bare the conventions and mechanisms of the nineteenth-century theatrical world.

On the podium will be Alberto Zanardi, already applauded in the 2024 edition of the festival for the musical direction of Zoraida di Granata, conducting theDonizetti Opera Orchestra and the Chorus of the Accademia Teatro alla Scala. It is directed by Silvia Paoli, who returns to the Donizetti Opera after having signed the staging of Henry of Burgundy in 2018, with sets by Eleonora De Leo, costumes by Ilaria Ariemme and lighting by Fiammetta Baldiserri.

The role en travesti of Mamma Agata, the most famous and comic in the opera, will be played by bass-baritone Paolo Bordogna, already a darling of Donizetti Opera audiences, a bond strengthened by his portrayal of Cardenio in the Furioso on the island of S. Domingo at last year’s festival. Alongside him are the talents of the Bottega Donizetti 2026 who will participate in master classes in May, coordinated by Giulio Zappa. Completing the cast will be soprano Elene Gvritishvili (Daria), the tenor Filip Filipović (William) and bass-baritone Mattia Venni (Impresario).

 

Donizetti OFF 2026

In anticipation of the festival, programming extends beyond the theater with the rich program Donizetti OFF, which accompanies audiences throughout the year, eventually enlivening the days of the festival with meetings, screenings, concerts and guided tours.

 

CineDOpear

The Sunday screening series CineDOpear, scheduled monthly from May to October (with the exception of August) in the “M. Tremaglia” Music Room of the Donizetti Theater at 3 p.m., presents five titles produced in different editions of Donizetti Opera, each introduced by musicologists from the Centro Studi Donizettiani: Kenilworth Castle Sunday, May 24, with Candida Mantica, Belisario Sunday, June 14, with Paolo Fabbri, The wedding in the villa Sunday, July 5, again with Paolo Fabbri, Lucie de Lammermoor Sunday, September 20, with Candida Mantica and Roberto Devereux Sunday, Oct. 11, with Livio Aragona and Maurizio Merisio. Admission is free with reservations recommended on the festival website.

 

Music Festival

On the occasion of the Music Day, which occurs every year on June 21, the day of the summer solstice, the Donizetti Theater opens its doors to the city on Saturday, June 20, from the afternoon until late evening. It starts with Meet the Donizetti, itinerary interactive through various rooms and places of the theater, curated by Clelia Epis, which allows visitors to explore the monument from unusual viewpoints, including anecdotes and curiosities from the world of opera and the city. Guided tours will be available starting at 4 p.m. in shifts in Italian and, for the first time, in English (free admission with reservations required on the theater’s website).

To follow, from 7:30 p.m. the DO Happy hour at the bar of the Ridotto Gavazzeni, reserved for ticket holders of the evening performance, will allow a preview tasting of the new cocktail dedicated to the 2026 festival. Finally, at 9 p.m. it will be the turn of the participatory performance, able to engage, entertain and excite the whole audience, in line with the theme of this year’s Festival: The Voice of Places. From ages 8 to 99! Open bookings for guided tours and tickets on sale from April 21.

 

Gianandrea Gavazzeni experience. Man of the twentieth century

From October 15 to November 29. the Donizetti Studio, the Donizetti Theater and various places in the city will host the widespread documentary exhibition Gianandrea Gavazzeni experience. Man of the twentieth century , dedicated to the great Maestro from Bergamo on the 30th anniversary of his death. Conductor, composer and writer, among the most radiant protagonists of twentieth-century music, to whom much is owed in the rediscovery of Donizetti’s heritage and in the redefinition of Bergamo’s role on the international musical map. The exhibition is part of the project To Gianandrea Gavazzeni. Music, gesture, memory. 1996-2026 involving the Donizetti Theater Foundation with the Donizetti Opera Festival, the Vittorio Polli and Anna Maria Stoppani Foundation with the Victor de Sabata and Aldo Ceccato Music Library, and the Brescia and Bergamo International Piano Festival.

 

Gala “Tribute to Gianandrea Gavazzeni”

Always in the sign of Gavazzenian celebrations, on Thursday, November 19 at 8:30 p.m. at Teatro Donizetti, the festival intends to pay tribute to Gianandrea Gavazzeni with a concert of exceptional voices, conducted by Riccardo Frizza. Tickets will go on sale from July 25, the Maestro’s birthday.

 

The Donizetti Brunch: Donizetti Songs

Confirmed the highly appreciated initiative of the Donizetti Brunch, a formula that offers morning concerts Sundays of the festival at 11 a.m. in the Ridotto Gavazzeni of the Donizetti Theater, followed by a breakfast in the scenic Allianz Hall. The three concerts on Nov. 15, 22 and 29 are produced in collaboration with Rare Work, a British cultural institution that aims to restore and promote with recordings and live performances little-performed or forgotten compositions. These include the approx. two hundred songs, arias, barcarole, and cantatas for voice and piano composed by Gaetano Donizetti that, since 2023, Opera Rara has been bringing back to light and that the Festival has set a goal of performing live over the three-year period 2025-2027. Highlights on this year’s program include a series of pieces that Donizetti composed for voice with the addition of a solo instrument. Among more well-known pieces and some precious unpublished, including six duets presented as world premieres in the modern era, this year will again feature, as in the last edition, the pupils and students of the Bottega Donizetti accompanied on the piano by the project coordinator and vocal coach Giulio Zappa.

 

Opera Family

Every Saturday of the festival the program Opera Family offers an activity designed for young and old, capable of bringing families closer to the world of opera with ever-new languages. It begins Saturday, Nov. 14 at the Donizetti Theater, at 3 p.m., with Qui Maestro Gavazzeni, a participatory visit by Clelia Epis which leads children and parents into the theater’s spaces to discover the role of the conductor, through sketches, period photographs and archival accounts of performances directed by the great Maestro from Bergamo. The visit ends with a listening challenge: whoever can remember the most details will win an exclusive prize (recommended for ages 8 and up).

Saturday, Nov. 21, in the Gavazzeni Redoubt, also beginning at 3 p.m., debuts Magic Wands, a new production for children from 3 to 7 years old conceived and directed directorally by Mauro De Santis, with the artistic collaboration of Fabio Cocifoglia. The stage director is preparing the show, but the orchestra is late and the conductor has not yet arrived: amid jokes and magic, a valiant baton capable of saving the day will be sought from the audience. Preceding the performance is a workshop that will enable greater audience involvement in the story on stage.

Finally, Saturday, Nov. 28 the Donizetti Theater will stage the participatory opera Tornado Agata. Conveniences and inconveniences of a mom at work. , loosely taken from Le convenienze ed inconvenienze teatrali by Gaetano Donizetti, with musical dramaturgy by Alberto Zanardi in collaboration with Mariagrazia Mercaldo, the direction of Nicolò Jacopo Suppa, the direction of Paola Brunello and theDonizetti Opera Ensemble (recommended for ages 8 and up). Appointment at 3 p.m. with the singing workshop preceding the performance to learn the choruses of the opera. The performance will, in addition, be offered for schools on previous days: Wednesday, Nov. 25 at 9:30 a.m. and 11:30 a.m., Thursday, Nov. 26 and Friday, Nov. 27 at 9 a.m. and 11 a.m.

 

Breakfast with Gaetano: music, milk and imagination!

They return to the Sunday mornings of the 15 and of Nov. 22, at 10 a.m. in the historic halls of the Donizetti Theater, the family events. Breakfast with Gaetano: music, milk and fantasy! offering activities for boys and girls ages 6 and up with their parents, crowned by a tasty breakfast together under the banner of environmental sustainability and social solidarity. An interactive guided tour of the Donizetti Theater with a workshop dedicated to theatrical costumes is scheduled for Sunday 15, while a sound experience in collaboration with Dalmine Foundation will be offered on Sunday 22.

 

Accessibility project

Donizetti Opera 2026 confirms and strengthens its commitment to theaccessibility understood as a structural component of the cultural project. This year the festival focuses its attention on actions aimed at a deaf audience, In collaboration with the Fedora Association, a specialist on the topic of cultural accessibility, with which it is developing a multifaceted set of activities ranging from cultural mediation to staff training. On the occasion of a performance of The theatrical conveniences and inconveniences. and Opera Family on Nov. 28 will, therefore, be operating a service to welcome and enjoy the performance in support of deaf people. Specific communication and preparation actions for viewing are, in addition, planned, such as a presentation of the work in LIS – Italian sign language and easy language, the music workshop The body of music with sensory platforms, a guided tour of the theater in LIS and a workshop for accessible boys and girls as part of Opera Family. To support the enjoyment of the events, the festival will also provide the introductory and in-depth materials made in different languages and languages, such as CAA – Alternative Augmentative Communication and easy language.

 

“Maestro Riccardo Frizza’s program for 2026,” declares Sergio Gandi, deputy mayor and councilor for culture of the City of Bergamo. – lives up to the reputation the festival has earned in recent years: three new productions, artists of international stature and a dedication to Gianandrea Gavazzeni, a key figure in the musical history of our city and in the revival of Donizetti’s name in the world. It is a gesture of gratitude and memory that belongs to us as a community.

An indispensable value of the event is also its commitment to the accessibility of culture – the project aimed at deaf people is a significant innovation, capable of broadening inclusion and participation – and especially to the involvement of the new generations, with a considerable effort directed at stimulating more and more young people, girls, and children of all ages, with their families, to attend bel canto.

Donizetti Opera is not only a festival of the highest artistic level: it is one of the most effective cultural investments that Bergamo has sustained in recent years. The data speak for themselves: each edition brings thousands of spectators from all over Italy and abroad to the city, generates significant tourist presences and feeds an induced activity that involves the entire hospitality and services chain. The municipal administration supports this festival in the awareness that culture and economic development are not contradictory goals, but two sides of the same coin.

Our thanks go to the Donizetti Theatre Foundation and its entire team: the work they do, with skill and dedication, is what turns an ambitious artistic vision into a concrete reality that is accessible to all.”

 

“The Donizetti Opera festival is the result of collective work,” continues Giorgio Berta, president of the Donizetti Theatre Foundation. – which is renewed and enriched every year: institutions, artists, partners, supporters and Donizetti Ambassadors, all united around an ambitious cultural project that has in the voice, music and figure of Gaetano Donizetti its center of gravity. To all of them I renew my most sincere gratitude, because without this system of alliances a festival of this level would not be possible.

The 2026 edition also marks a special moment: dedicating the festival to the memory of Gianandrea Gavazzeni on the thirtieth anniversary of his death is not only a gesture of gratitude to a great Maestro from Bergamo, an illustrious fellow citizen, but also a way to recall the deep roots from which this festival was born and from which it continues to draw strength. The “Donizetti Renaissance” that Gavazzeni helped to build is the very premise of Donizetti Opera: let us, therefore, continue with conviction in our commitment to the preservation and dissemination of the heritage of which we are among the world’s greatest custodians.

In this regard, with Maestro Riccardo Frizza we are following a three-year path that is bearing concrete and visible fruits: in the quality of productions, in the increase of the international dimension, in the ability to attract leading artists, as well as to involve and train new generations. We are in the second year of this journey and the results encourage us to move forward with even greater determination.”

 

“Each edition of Donizetti Opera is a creative and organizational challenge that the Foundation faces with enthusiasm, competence and professionalism,” adds Massimo Boffelli, general director of the Donizetti Theatre Foundation -. With 2026 we are in the second year of the three-year journey started with Maestro Riccardo Frizza, and the results in terms of international audience appeal, critical and media attention and recognition confirm that the direction taken is the right one.

This year we want to raise the bar even higher: in addition to a playbill of the highest caliber, with two authentic Donizetti rarities and a cast of artists from all over the world, the festival is enriched with a new and necessary dimension, that of accessibility, which we are methodically and convincingly building as an integral part of the cultural project and not as an episodic intervention. Not to mention the dedication to Gianandrea Gavazzeni: a thread that links the deepest history of this theater to the present and future of the festival.

Donizetti Opera today is a system that works because it knows how to hold together artistic ambition, rootedness in the territory and international openness. Continuing to make it grow, maintaining high quality and expanding audiences, is the goal that guides the Foundation’s work every day.”