Between heroism and comedy, Cavalli’s “Il Giasone” was the greatest operatic success of the seventeenth century. Rediscover this colourful Baroque fresco at the Grand Théâtre de Genève, in Serena Sinigaglia’s inventive staging, under the vibrant direction of Leonardo García-Alarcón. 
By 
In mid-seventeenth-century Venice, opera was king. And Francesco Cavalli’s Il Giasone was one of its greatest triumphs. The production presented at the Grand Théâtre de Genève in 2017 by Serena Sinigaglia and Leonardo García-Alarcón was a true celebration, capturing the opulence and inventiveness of La Serenissima.
The first great popular success of opera
Premiered in Venice in 1649, Il Giasone became the most frequently performed opera of the seventeenth century. As a landmark work, it occupies a central place in the emergence of this new art form. Over the course of some thirty years, Francesco Cavalli would compose more than forty operas, bringing to its height the legacy of his master, Monteverdi.
Venetian opera was a cultural phenomenon: initially an aristocratic experiment, it quickly evolved into a form of popular entertainment. By the 1670s it was attracting wide audiences, drawn to a dramaturgy that skilfully combined the heroic with the comic. The plots drew on great myths but incorporated devices from Italian comedy and burlesque theatre. Playwrights and librettists readily resorted to farcical situations, tangled love affairs, disguises and satirical scenes.
Theatres, being private enterprises, had to ensure profitability: filling houses, attracting and retaining audiences. Comedy became a reliable guarantee of success. Yet behind the levity and laughter, a deeper reflection emerged: in reinterpreting Greek myths with humour, Venetian opera also provided a space of liberty and implicit critique — a joyful breath of fresh air in a society undergoing profound change.
The Baroque spirit revived in Geneva
Il Giasone is Baroque in the truest sense: everything is permitted, everything interwoven — passion with farce, heroism with the grotesque. Serena Sinigaglia’s 2017 staging at the Grand Théâtre de Genève embraced this aesthetic of surprise and exuberance.
With the irrepressible energy of Leonardo García-Alarcón and his Cappella Mediterranea, the production paid homage to the lavishness of Venetian spectacle: shifting sets, play of lights, stage machinery and visual inventions combined to recreate its original magic. Far from a static reconstruction, this reading restored to the work its breath of freedom — that mixture of sensuality, irony and excess which made early Baroque so captivating.
This summer, Total Baroque Magazine invites you to embark on this musical and theatrical journey alongside Jason and his companions: an adventure where the sheer joy of performance meets the history of a genre that shaped European opera.
Programme
🎼 Francesco Cavalli (1602-1676):
- Il Giasone, musical drama in a prologue and 3 acts
Libretto: Giacinto Andrea Cicognini
Musical direction: Leonardo García-Alarcón, Cappella Mediterranea
Stage direction: Serena Sinigaglia
Sets and costumes: Ezio Toffolutti
Lightening: Simon Trottet
Cast:
- Giasone – Valer Sabadus
- Medea – Kristina Hammarström
- Sole / Isifile – Kristina Mkhitaryan
- Oreste / Giove – Willard White
- Besso – Günes Gürle
- Egeo – Raúl Giménez
- Ercole – Alexander Milev
- Delfa / Eolo – Dominique Visse
- Demo / Volano – Migran Agadzhanyan
- Alinda – Mariana Florès
- Amore – Mary Feminear
At the Grand Théâtre de Genève, 2017.
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