Soprano Gasdia reboots troubled Verona Arena opera festival

VERONA, Italy — The colossal Roman-era Verona Arena amphitheater remains an imposing presence in the northern Italian city’s main piazza, but its place in the opera world has waned in recent years.

The popular Verona Arena summer festival has lost both audience and prestige and nearly closed two seasons ago under a mountain of debt. Now the artists and public who have sustained it are putting their hopes for a relaunch in the hands of a former opera singer who this year became the first to run an Italian lyric theater.

Soprano Cecilia Gasdia, a 57-year-old Verona native who has appeared on the Arena stage as an extra, a chorus member and a star, inherited a troubled festival that has struggled for years.

For her inaugural season as general manager, Gasdia has used her connections in the singing world to secure top voices with the aim of boosting ticket sales in the 13,500-seat amphitheater, the biggest open-air opera theater in the world, which in recent years has seen audiences plunge.

“I know the whole opera world and the singers have all helped me. From February and March, I worked day and night to convince them,” Gasdia said, adding that many singers also agreed to take a cut in their usual fees for this season.

With short notice, Gasdia booked Russian mezzo-soprano Anna Goryachova as Carmen opposite Arena newcomer American tenor Brian Jagde as Don Jose, sharing the role with Italian tenor Francesco Meli.

Gasdia also coaxed back Leo Nucci, one of Italy’s most renowned baritones, who had announced last year at 75 he had sung his last aria in the Verona Arena, reprising one of his signature roles, “Il Barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville).”