Our dream has almost become a reality and now with just a little more finance, we will be able to acquire our chosen site and to start to reconstruct the Teatro San Cassiano of 1637. We still hope to achieve that within 2028.

More importantly, the reconstructed Teatro San Cassiano will give us the opportunity to celebrate the birth of public opera and to restore the magical spectacle of HIP opera to Venice; and beyond to recover the many great drammi per musica lost to us all today.

But to return to the beginning, our first international conference "TEATRO SAN CASSIANO: NEED, SOLUTION, OPPORTUNITY" took place in Venice from 13 to 16 June 2019, in the enchanting setting of the “Sala Concerti” of the Conservatorio “Benedetto Marcello” di Venezia.

The aim of the conference was to bring together some of the world’s best international experts to share and discuss the essential aspects of the project over three days dedicated respectively to the NEED for the reconstruction of the Teatro San Cassiano, to the SOLUTON given by the reimagination of the theatre of 1637—based on rigorous archival research (and, of course, on the work of historians who in the past have dealt with Venetian theatres and the Teatro San Cassiano in particular)—and, finally, the OPPORTUNITY that the Teatro San Cassiano will be able to offer, as well as on an international level, in Venice and its territory from a cultural, commercial, employment, tourist and educational viewpoint.

The full success of the conference was crowned by the extraordinary closing concert on Saturday 15 June 2019, with music by Claudio Monteverdi, Antonio Gianettini and other composers linked in various ways to Venice and to the Teatro San Cassiano. Impeccable protagonists were the conductors Jane Glover and Ondřej Macek, the Venice Baroque Orchestra and the voices of Giacomo Schiavo (who promptly replaced Furio Zanasi, present but unfortunately indisposed, in the role of Testo in the Combattimento di Tancredi et Clorinda), Marina Bartoli, Giulia Bolcato, and Marco Barbon. Also worthy of note is the excellent performance of both the Baroque Orchestra of the "Benedett Marcello" (preparatory teachers Tiziano Bagnati, Cristiano Contadin, Enrico Parizzi and Francesco Erle (music director); and students Rita Celanzi, Agnese Fiori, Sebastiano Franz, Alessandra Box, Cecilia Zanotto, Maria Bocelli, Pedro Raposo Pereira, Carlo Santi, Davide Gazzato, Michele Mancusi, Mizuho Furukubo), and the voices of Ligia Ishitani, Andrea Gavagnin, Yihao Duan, Lidia Fridman. 

Many of these students have gone on to great success in this time and we feel a very close bond to each of them.

This is our opportunity to thank all those involved, both in terms of our wonderful participants and the many incredible Venetian companies without whom the considerable success of the conference would not have been possible.

For full conference and concert programme click here