 | Milan Teatro alla Scala Reviews | Tips 1 - 10 of 71 |  |
The most venerated temple to opera in the world, the outward appearance of Teatro alla Scala belies its internal beauty. Designed by architect Giuseppe Piermarini, La Scala opened its door to the world in 1778 with Antonio Salieri's "L'Europa Riconosciuta." La Scala was built to replace the Regio Teatro Ducal built in 1589 and destroyed by fire. La Scala is built on the former site of the church of Santa Maria alla Scala.
La Scala is known far and wide for its incomparable acoustics and many musical giants that performed here or had their works performed here including Verdi; opera singer, Maria Callas; and Arturo Toscanini. It is also home to Scuolo di Ballo (La Scalla's Ballet Company) and Museo Teatrale alla Scala which is located in its annex. For those VT'rs who were Thespians and Garricks, you might enjoy the museum here which is said to be a treasure of paintings, sculpture, backdrops and other memorabilia of prominent singers and composers who have created history in La Scala. Currently undergoing renovation (which began in 2002), the face of La Scala was shrouded when I saw it. Current productions are being held at Teatro Arcimboldi, but the grand dame is scheduled to reopen December 7, 2004.
Combination tickets for the La Scala Museum, Piacoteca di Brera, and the Cena colo Vinciano cost 10 euros and are valid for 7 days. However, reservations cost an additional 1,5 euros. Leave a Comment Address: Piazza della Scala, MilanPhone: Info: 39-02-72003744Directions: Directly behind the Vittorio Emanuele Galleria (at the top of the cross)and on the edge of Piazza della Scala. The statue of Da Vinci is facing La Scala!Website: www.teatroallascala.org Other Contact: Bigliettera@teatroallascala.org
|
 | |  |
Visiting Milan?
Read reviews about Milan Hotels
Real Reviews from Real VirtualTourist Members.
On one of my Strasbourg tips I noted that I had paid 46.80 Euros at the Strasbourg opera house for a seat with only a partial view of the stage.
At the time this struck me as being rather crass, but it turns out to have been good value for money compared to Milan's Teatro alla Scala, where I paid 66.00 Euros for a seat with no view of the stage whatsoever. The only way I could see even part of the stage was to stand up and lean over, thus blocking the (limited) view of two other people behind me. So I only did this every five minutes or so, for a quick look.
Actually I was forewarned about this, because La Scala acknowledges the problem on their website.
"Dear members of the audience," they write, "La Scala is a theatre with boxes in the style known as 'Italian', designed by the architect Piermarini in 1778 for Milan back then. It has a plan in straight horseshoe, that is, tapered to the proscenium - which is an extreme and rigorous evolution of the antique Greek theatre."
They go on to say that an opera house like La Scala, "above all in the boxes", requires an "active" participation on the part of the audience, and they mention a famous historical drawing showing people leaning out to see the stage.
"We therefore publish on our website a significant sample of the views from the boxes, so that everyone can know the dimension, the disposition and the spirit of a theatre built for the customs and habits of the late 18th century audience. To prepare oneself to an experience that is somehow also a travel in time."
From the photos on their website you do get a hint of what awaits you, but only a hint, since the photos were taken when the house was empty, so in reality you see even less as soon as someone is sitting in front of you.
There were five people in my box. The Italian man had been to La Scala before and had booked a "seat" where he could stand the whole time and not block anybody else's view. The French woman said she went to all the new productions at the Bastille opera house in Paris, where she never paid more than 20 Euros and always had a full view of the stage.
An elderly American couple had the two front seats of our box. They had paid 170 Euros each for their seats, plus various booking fees and agency markups, so that altogether the evening had cost them well over seven hundred U.S. dollars even though they could see only about a third of the stage.
The woman didn't mind, because she slept through the whole performance anyway, but her husband was bitterly disappointed. He was a 75-year-old retired professor who had been dreaming all his life of seeing an opera at La Scala, and he was totally shattered by the reality of the place. Because of problems with his back he couldn't even lean out over the edge to get a better view.
During the first intermission he complained bitterly to the ushers about this situation, and in the second intermission they told him that he and his wife could move down to the stalls (aka orchestra-level) where they had found two free seats.
So I got to sit in his 170-euro seat for the last third of the evening, which was a great improvement for me because I could actually see a fraction of the stage.
What I "saw" that evening was Il trittico, a collection of three short operas by Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924).
When I returned to Frankfurt am Main people asked me if the Scala production of Il trittico was as good as the one at the Frankfurt Opera a few months before. Well, it wasn't, but since I only saw snippets of the staging I can't really comment in any great detail.
Second, third and fourth photos: Looking up at the four tiers of boxes and two galleries. From the center boxes directly opposite the stage you can actually see what's going on.
Fifth photo: Just before show time.
To understand the seating arrangements at La Scala and similar opera houses, keep in mind that in the 18th century the best seats in the house were not the ones where you could see the stage, but the ones where the rest of the audience could see you -- if you chose to expose yourself to their view.
You have to imagine the common folks down in the stalls gazing up at the boxes and exclaiming to each other: "Look, the Countess X is in her box tonight! I saw her! She even smiled at me, sort of." At least the Countess could get her kicks imagining that that's what the common folks were saying. Leave a Comment Address: Via Filodrammatici 2 - 20121 MilanoPhone: +39.02.88.79.1Directions: 45°28'2.28" North; 9°11'23.17" East. If for some reason you can't come by bicycle you could take the underground to Duomo, Cordusio or Monteapoleone. Or the tram # 1 or 2 to Manzoni-Scala. Or bus 61 to Verdi - via dell'Orso.Website: http://www.teatroallascala.org/en/guidaallabiglietteria/palchi.html
|
| | |
Located in the homonym square, Teatro alla Scala was built on the side of 1381 St. Maria della Scala church.
The Austrian Empress Maria Theresa was the one who actually financed the construction of the theater and the architect was Giuseppe Piermarini, a passionate advocate of the neo-classical school.
The theater was officially inaugurated in 1778 with Antonio Salieri's "Europa Riconosciuta".
La Scala was reopened in December 2004 after a three-year break due to complex restoration and renovation works.
|
The two upper tiers at La Scala are known as the galleries.
For my second evening at La Scala I paid EUR 24.00 for a ticket in the last row of the topmost gallery. From the seat itself I could see nothing, but since there was no one behind me I could simply stand up the whole time and see nearly the entire stage, except for a small strip that was blocked by a pillar. So my 24 Euro gallery seat was much better than the 66 Euro box seat I had had the week before.
The opera I saw from the gallery was the premiere (actually a revival of a 1997 production by Graham Vick, but they still called it a premiere) of Macbeth by Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901).
On the back of every La Scala ticket it says: "Formal dress is required at premiere performances." And on their website they say: "Gentlemen are kindly requested to wear evening dress for premieres. Gentlemen are in any case required to wear a jacket and tie at all performances." (In Italian: " È gradito l'abito scuro per le prime rappresentazioni e sempre la giacca e la cravatta per i Signori spettatori.")
I was surprised at this, so I posted a query in the Milan Forum here on VirtualTourist, and was quickly assured by VT member Maurizioago that a suit and tie would do. ("...and no beard! I'm joking!")
In fact it turned out that the gallery spectators at La Scala were just as sloppily dressed as their counterparts in all the other opera houses I know.
Another thing I had heard was that people in the galleries were hyper-critical and quick to boo at the slightest provocation -- and this turned out to be very true! At the end of the evening they booed just about everybody who ventured out on stage, including the conductor Kazushi Ono and the soprano Violeta Urmana, both of whom I thought did all right.
One woman in front of me kept shouting "Vergogna! Vergogna!" (Shame! Shame!) and a short but loud altercation erupted between the boo-people and the bravo-people.
In my opinion the performance went reasonably well despite the fact that star baritone Leo Nucci, who was singing the title role of Macbeth, got sick and had to be replaced after the first act. His understudy Ivan Inverardi took over and saved the show, but some people even booed him at the end, quite unfairly. (He's not a fantastic singer like Nucci, but he's easier to understand and he's a good actor.)
A high point of the performance for me was a ballet at the beginning of the third act. This is usually left out nowadays, but La Scala retained it, and it was beautifully danced by La Scala's Ballet Company -- more about them in a later tip.
Second photo: As in a lot of older opera houses (Stuttgart, for example) people with gallery tickets do not enter through the main entrance, but through a side entrance leading to this nondescript staircase that leads up to their (relatively) cheap seats.
Third photo: Gallery spectators have their own foyer for the intermissions aka intervals. As you can see, they are not formally dressed.
Fourth photo: Spectators in the galleries just before show time.
Also present at this same performance of Verdi's Macbeth was Opera Chic, who according to Classical Singer magazine is "the world’s foremost opera blogger".
(Her own self-description: "I'm a young American woman living in Milan, and you're not. I go to La Scala a lot, and you don't.")
But she was sitting downstairs somewhere, not up in the galleries with us impecunious folks.
She posted her first report during the intermission after the first act: "BREAKING: 'Indisposed' Leo Nucci Leaves Scala Stage Mid-Macbeth, Understudy Ivan Inverardi (Who?) Saves Teh Day".
In this report she wrote among other things: "Opera Chic's hugest get-well-soon to Maestro Nucci, greatest Verdi baritone of this post-Cappuccilli age; and big props -- no matter how he sang -- to Inverardi who had to step to the plate in an emergency."
I've never met Opera Chic, by the way (we use different entrances and staircases), but she's never met me either, so that makes us even. Leave a Comment
|
| | |
Visiting La Scala Museum is the best way to learn more about the history of the theater and the history of lyric music in general.
The museum was founded at the beginning of 20th century and houses three collections: the Giulio Sambon Collection acquired in Paris, the Verdi Collection, and the Theater Collection, being one of the largest and most complete theatrical collections, with around 80,000 volumes.
|
Visiting Milan?
Read reviews about Milan Hotels
Real Reviews from Real VirtualTourist Members.
A few days before each premiere La Scala presents an introductory talk, in Italian, about the upcoming production.
These talks are held in the “Arturo Toscanini” foyer at 6 pm. Admission is free and you don't need a ticket to get in, you just have to be one of the first 250 people to arrive at the main entrance of La Scala. When I was there the foyer wasn't quite full, so they didn't have to turn anybody away.
Unfortunately the talk I attended happened to be on my first evening in Milan, shortly after I got off the train, so my Italian listening comprehension was still somewhat rusty. I understood some of the more obvious points (things I already knew about Verdi's opera Macbeth), but missed most of the subtleties. And when people laughed I never knew what they were laughing about.
Second photo: The speaker was Antonio Rostangno from the University "La Sapienza" in Rome.
Third photo: Bust of Pietro Mascagni (1863-1945), composer of Cavalleria Rusticana and other operas, in the Foyer Arturo Toscanini. Leave a Comment
|
| | |
In one wing of the opera house, off to the left of the main entrance, is the Theater Museum of La Scala.
The first photo shows the entrance to the museum, which is also the entrance to the galleries when there is an opera performance. And this is also where the scalpers tend to hang out trying to sell black-market tickets at exorbitant prices.
The museum consists of ten rooms with displays of musical instruments, paintings and other artifacts from the history of opera in general and La Scala in particular.
Also there is a space for temporary exhibitions. When I was there the exhibit was on the singer Maria Callas at La Scala.
No photography is allowed inside the museum.
The museum is open almost every day (all except nine days per year) from 9 am to 12.30 pm (last entrance at 12 noon) and from 1.30 pm to 5.30 pm (last entrance at 5 pm). A normal full-price admission ticket costs five Euros and includes a glimpse of the auditorium from one of the boxes, except when rehearsals or performances are in progress.
When I was there they were adjusting the lighting for the first act of Verdi's Macbeth (as in other opera houses, an extra player wearing one of the costumes had to stand around for hours while they did this), but we were allowed to have a look just the same.
Second photo: For three days during my visit to Milan there was a large trailer from the Cecilia Bartoli Music Foundation parked outside the museum. In it was an interesting free exhibition on the famous singer Maria Malibran (1808-1836). Malibran was the big star of La Scala for three seasons in the 1830s. Of course Cecilia Bartoli herself was also in town to give a recital of arias from Malibran's repertoire, "Malibran Rediscovered". Leave a Comment
|
| | |
When I took this first photo on a sunny spring morning I was trying to get La Scala from the same angle as in a famous painting by Angelo Inganni from the year 1852.
At that time the opera house was in a narrow street because the square, Piazza della Scala, was not created until several years later, in 1858. Of course there were no tram tracks or overhead wires in those days, and no traffic lights.
Actually Inganni did at least two such paintings from slightly different angles, each with a two-horse carriage going off in different directions.
Second photo: Here's what one of the Inganni paintings looks like. In another version I have seen, there are two little boys scuffling in the foreground and the two-horse carriage is veering off to the left (our left, that is; their right).
Third photo: Here's La Scala as seen from the square, with one of the old fashioned orange trams going by.
Fourth photo: La Scala lit up at night, as seen from the square. Leave a Comment
|
| | |
When the Teatro alla Scala was closed for restructuring at the beginning of 2002 they didn't exactly tell the general public what they were planning to do.
About a year later there was a huge outcry when someone discovered from an aerial photograph that there was nothing but a huge hole where the historic 18th century stage used to be. This is when the management came out with the truth of the matter, which was that the old impractical stage was being replaced by brand new a state-of-the-art high-tech 21st century stage and backstage with all the latest machinery, so they could make scene changes without having hundreds of stage hands lugging things around.
When the restructuring was finished at the end of 2004 there were two very visible new elements sticking out from behind the historical façade.
On the left in the photo is an ellipsis which contains among other things the dressing rooms for the singers, dancers, technicians, orchestra and chorus. On the right is a new rectangular stage tower which contains all the new stage machinery as well as rehearsal halls for the chorus, orchestra and ballet company.
Second photo: In this nighttime photo of the façade you can see the rows of lights that have been placed in the rectangular stage tower.
Third photo: The ellipsis and the stage tower as seen from the roof of the cathedral. The glass dome in the foreground is the roof of the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II. Leave a Comment
|
| | |
If for some reason you would like to attend an opera performance at Milan's Teatro alla Scala (even after reading my other tips, LOL), you of course have to buy a ticket, which can be a problem since performances are generally sold out weeks or months ahead of time.
One way is to line up (well in advance of the date you want!) at the box office in the Duomo subway station, as these young folks are doing, though I suspect they are eligible for student tickets at reduced prices.
Or you can try to get one of the 140 numbered gallery tickets that go on sale on the day of the performance. There are elaborate regulations for getting one of these tickets -- only one per person. I've never done it, so I can't speak from personal experience, but basically you have to line up at the ticket office in Via Filodrammatici (not the one in the subway station) by 1 pm to get your name put on the list, and then be there again at 5.30 pm for the roll call and sale of the tickets. And then be back at 8 pm for the performance, so it's pretty much of an all-day procedure.
Another way is to spend several hundred Euros and buy a black-market ticket from one of the scalpers who hang around the entrance to the Scala Museum every afternoon. These are shady-looking characters who talk out of the sides of their mouths, wear their hats down over their eyes and have several tickets fanned out in one hand (I'm not making this up).
Or you could buy your tickets on the internet, as I did. After lots of clicking around I finally managed to snag tickets for two different performances.
They have a list on their website of when each opera goes on sale (about two months before the premiere), and when I tried to access their website at 9 a.m. Italian time on the first day I kept getting notices saying they were overloaded and please try again later.
When I got in an hour later there were no tickets left, BUT. . . I discovered that the trick is to try again six hours later, because anyone who has reserved a ticket has six hours to pay for it, and if they don't it goes back on sale.
So at 3 pm Italian time the number of available tickets on different dates starts changing from 0 to 1 or 2 or whatever (the record was 13 while I was watching), and then back to 0 again a few minutes later. So you just have to keep watching the numbers, and when a ticket you want shows up on the screen, pounce on it. Of course it helps if you live in the same time zone and have nothing particular to do on that afternoon.
If you live in California, for instance, you would have to get up at six o'clock in the morning to do this.
Second photo: More people lining up for tickets at the box office in the subway station. Leave a Comment
|
| | |
|
 |
 |
Search Hotels
Find the best room rates |
|
 |
|
on April 23, 2004
on July 3, 2008
on May 22, 2006
