From Saturday 21 to Sunday 29 March, at the Teatro Comunale Nouveau in Bologna, Rapsodia Satanica / Cavalleria Rusticana by Pietro Mascagni will be staged.
Mascagni was a curious man. After drawing inspiration from contemporary literature for his debut opera (Cavalleria rusticana, based on Verga), he never ceased to explore new paths in his later works, even though he would never again achieve the extraordinary and enduring success of that 1890 premiere. He became interested in cinema, and in 1917—among the pioneers of the genre—composed the score for Rapsodia satanica by Nino Oxilia.
Within the nineteenth-century operatic tradition, the essential ingredients of the drama in Cavalleria Rusticana are hardly uncommon: two women (Santuzza and Lola) love the same man (Turiddu), and the jealousy of the betrayed (Santuzza and Alfio, Lola’s husband) leads to a fatal outcome. What changes—as in Verga—is the manner of narration, the language: recognizable, expansive, ardent melodies; primal, visceral emotions entrusted to characters from the people.
The film starring diva Lyda Borelli is of an entirely different nature: D’Annunzian poetics, a Faustian subject, eros and thanatos, and a highly sophisticated Art Nouveau aesthetic. In short, we are at the opposite pole of the positivism from which the verismo movement emerged; here truth, popular culture, and rationality are rejected with aristocratic disdain. Yet Mascagni’s curious and versatile spirit successfully embraced this challenge, placing at the service of the camera not only his gift for immediate and communicative thematic invention, not only the decadent flourishes already explored in his operas, but also his ability to transform operatic language into cinematic language—and vice versa.
Opera in one act
Libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci
Based on the novella of the same name by Giovanni Verga
Conductor
Daniel Oren
Direction
Emma Dante
Production by Teatro Comunale di Bologna
Orchestra, Chorus and Technical Staff of Teatro Comunale di Bologna
Chorus Master Gea Garatti Ansini
Cast and performers: read more on the website www.tcbo.it/eventi/opera-2026-rapsodia-satanica-cavalleria-rusticana
Program
| Saturday 21 March | From 08:00 PM |
| Sunday 22 March | From 04:00 PM |
| Wednesday 25 March | From 20:00 PM |
| Thursday 26 March | From 06:00 PM |
| Saturday 28 March | From 06:00 PM |
| Sunday 29 March | From 04:00 PM |
Map
Rapsodia Satanica / Cavalleria Rusticana | Comunale Nouveau
Piazza della Costituzione 4
40128 Bologna
Distance from Bologna Comunale Nouveau
Telephone: +39 051 529019
Email: boxoffice@comunalebologna.it
Site/minisite/other: https://www.tcbo.it/eventi/opera-2026-rapsodia-satanica-cavalleria-rusticana/
Interests
- Music & Exhibition




