In Controluce - L’Opera senz’Opera | Teatro Duse

The Teatro Duse in Bologna presents L’Opera senz’Opera, the new series produced by Innovio dedicated to the world of opera, featuring three concerts on 19 April and 10 and 15 May 2026.

An invisible thread runs through the history of opera: it connects those who wrote it, those who tell its stories and those who listen. Weaving this tapestry will be, from time to time, some of the authors most loved by the public, alongside new performers and perspectives.

The series retains the cross-cutting and imaginative format that has captivated audiences in recent years, weaving thought, music and images into a narrative that combines discovery, passion and enjoyment. Having inhabited the worlds of individual operas, the focus now broadens to those who created those worlds: the composers and their visions. Every great opera composer has transformed reality into theatre, pushing emotions — love, jealousy, hope, betrayal — to their limits and translating the tensions of their time into music.

The series begins in 2026 at the Teatro Duse with a trilogy dedicated to Puccini, Verdi and Mozart: three events, between April and May, dedicated to some central aspects of their artistic vision.

Guiding the entire cycle is the musicologist and populariser Fabio Sartorelli, who will accompany the audience through the three events, weaving together storytelling, listening and theatrical reflection. Joining him will be Giovanni C. F. Villa and Alessandro Vanoli, scholars from different fields, capable of opening up perspectives that unite history, the visual arts and European culture, creating unexpected links with the contemporary world.

In the first session, Puccini and the Feminine, on Sunday 19 April at 7pm with Fabio Sartorelli and Giovanni Carlo Federico Villa, Puccini’s theatre is examined through its female protagonists, the true driving forces of the drama. From Mimì to Tosca, from Butterfly to Turandot and Liù, the programme will explore several emblematic figures to demonstrate how, throughout his career, Puccini built a veritable theatrical laboratory centred on the female character, concentrating dramatic tension, orchestral colour and psychological depth.

Thesecond event, Verdi and the Discovery of Shakespeare, on Sunday 10 May at 7.00 pm with Fabio Sartorelli and Alessandro Vanoli, traces the relationship between Verdi and the great English playwright. From Macbeth, with its visionary and nocturnal atmosphere, we move on to the tragedy of Othello and the theatrical wit of Falstaff, where the drama dissolves into the lightness of a smile.

The series concludes with Mozart, Love and Loves, on Monday 25 May at 8 pm with Fabio Sartorelli and Giovanni Carlo Federico Villa. With Mozart and Da Ponte, opera enters the modern era: the characters breathe, change and desire. The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni and Così fan tutte thus become a theatrical workshop in which music reveals what words alone cannot express.