Dramma per musica

Libretto by Apostolo Zeno

The tale of the shepherdess Griselda is one of the most popular subjects for 18th-century opera. No wonder, since the King of Sicily’s marriage to a simple shepherdess who is forced to defend her virtue in a series of tests until she proves herself a true queen offers material for many eventful episodes and a wide range of emotions. The Italian composer Giovanni Bononcini wrote his version of Griselda in 1722 for the King’s Theatre in London. He shared the post of composer-in-residence there with none other than George Frideric Handel. The opera’s recitatives were missing for a long time, and it is only in recent years that the lyrical, yet extremely inventive score has been reconstructed. Max Emanuel Cencic, counter-tenor and head of the Bayreuth Baroque Opera Festival, has been energetic in his efforts to rediscover this pearl of Baroque opera and will now present it in Vienna with conductor Benjamin Bayl.

Concert performance in Italian with German surtitles

Introduction to the work 30 minutes before curtain-up