L’ITALIANA IN ALGERI

4 June - 10 July 2016

Isabella, a young Italian woman of independent spirit, resourcefulness and wit, is shipwrecked in a foreign land while searching for her sweetheart, Lindoro. There she finds herself at the mercy of the blustering Mustafà, the Bey of Algiers, who, bored of his long-suffering wife Elvira, decides Isabella will be the jewel of his harem. Little does Mustafà know that he has met his match in Isabella, who puts to use all the skills in her considerable armoury to escape his clutches, taking her beloved Lindoro with her.

Rossini was at the height of his inventive powers when he wrote L’italiana in Algeri and the audiences in Venice in 1813 went completely mad for it. Indeed madness, hilarity and a sense of the surreal permeate the entire opera, with its courageous heroine, Isabella, at the centre of a maelstrom of confusion, suffused throughout with humour and unaffected tenderness.

Renowned Rossini conductor David Parry is joined by director Will Tuckett and designer George Souglides, who both make their Garsington Opera debuts.

Sung in Italian with English supertitles