Codes of honour trip up Bechtolf’s Ernani at La Scala

Verdi: Ernani ***

Teatro alla Scala, Milan, 29th September 2018

George Bernard Shaw admired the “fierce noonday sun” of the score to Ernani. “The one with the bandits” evens gets a glancing mention in his play, Arms and the Man. I’m not convinced that Sven-Eric Bechtolf shares that sense of admiration. His new production for La Scala – ending a 36-year hiatus since Luca Ronconi’s celebrated staging opened the 1982-83 season – doesn’t exactly sneer at Verdi’s fifth opera, but Bechtolf does seem faintly embarrassed by it all. The Milanese audience rumbled him straight away.

Francesco Meli (Ernani and Ailyn Pérez (Elvira)
© Marco Brescia & Rudy Amisano | Teatro alla Scala

Read the full review on Bachtrack.