The 2008-2009 Scala season was introduced today to a disbelieving audience of journalists, flacks, various lackeys & hanger-ons, and it's as bad as we had heard it would be. Also, the already crazy expensive tickets will cost 10% more.
First things first: no Music Director in sight, all the power remains firmly in GM Stephane Lissner's canny hands (Daniel Barenboim remains as "Maestro Scaligero" figurehead, a glorified guest conductor who flies in once a year to conduct an opera -- when the orchestra is not on strike, as they were last year for his second performance of Tristan -- then plays the piano a few times, cashes the check and promptly disappears: we are also sure that Barenboim himself is not eager to take credit for the artistic direction la Scala is taking as of late, so all the talk about his role as "Maestro Scaligero" is essentially moot).
Anyway:
This coming season three (underwhelming) productions from the past three seasons will be rehashed -- Zeffirelli's Aida (Urmana/Licitra/Smirnova, conducted by Barenboim this time, in 2006 it had been conducted by Chailly in the infamous Alagna incident), Chereau's Tristan Und Isolde (it was last year's premiere on Dec 7), Bondy's Idomeneo (la prima in Dec 2005), in perfect "repertorio" style, just like the much-ridiculed (here) Vienna, la Scala as tourist destination, with safe operatic blockbusters ready for the various tourists and business visitors to enjoy.
La prima of December 7 will be, as already indicated, Don Carlo directed by Stefan Braunschweig, conducted by Daniele Gatti, Giuseppe Filianoti (who's 33 and vocally going on 63) as the big star (on Dec 4 they'll have basically a dress rehearsal open to students, in a gesture of goodwill toward the non-millionaire masses).
The rest of the season? Very slim pickings: I due foscari (conducted by Carlo Montanaro), Viaggio a Reims (Ciofi/Barcellona/Remigio, conducted by the underwhelming Ottavio Dantone and directed by Luca Ronconi), Donizetti's Le convenienze e inconvenienze teatrali (directed by TV comedian Antonio Albanese in what I assume has to be his opera debut, there are no singer names yet available), Monteverdi's Orfeo (directed by Bob Wilson, conducted by Rinaldo Alessandrini), Rake's Progress (Robert Lepage director, David Robertson conducting), Midsummer's Night Dream conducted by Andrew Davis, directed by Robert Carsen, with David Daniels)
The ballet season, thanks to a world-class corpo di ballo and to the greatest dancer alive, Roberto Bolle, is our consolation: there's a Roland Petit ballet based on music by the Pink Floyd that we'll probably skip.
Funniest moment of the day: an opera has been commissioned to composer Giorgio Battistelli for the 2011 season, based on An Inconvenient Truth, the best-selling book by Al Gore (Gore had recently been hired by Milan's Mayor to prepare a presentation supporting the nomination for Milan as host city of the 2015 Expo, arguing that the shockingly gray, polluted, bike lane-deprived city is in fact a paragon of green virtue).
Milan duly won, and now Al gets his opera at la Scala.
To sum it up:
zzzzzzzzz
Now if you'll excuse Opera Chic, she needs a cappuccino.