O’ Sole Mio: Neapolitan Songs and Great Opera Arias

Exuding the sheer elegance of Italy's fine operatic traditions and combining it with the passion and warmth of Neapolitan songs, this regular concert series in Florence has been wowing audiences for some time. O’ Sole Mio: Neapolitan Songs and Great Opera Arias takes the best of opera with some well-known pieces by the greatest Italian librettists and composers. The wonderful Florentine concerts also feature the memorable melodies of the Neapolitan tradition with songs that will be familiar to almost everyone who attends.
These impressive concerts bring together two apparently distinct musical worlds which are, nevertheless, extraordinarily complementary of one another. Each concert is a celebration, one that highlights the timeless beauty of Italian music, in all of its splendid cultures. What's more, the concerts are performed by an extraordinarily talented duo of vocalists. A soprano singer and a male baritone vocalist are accompanied at each concert by a pianist. Together, they express all the passion and tunefulness of some of the most famous compositions in Italy – and the world, for that matter.
The arrangement of beautiful harmonies lies at the heart of each rendition of O’ Sole Mio: Neapolitan Songs and Great Opera Arias. The performers accompany audiences in something of a musical dialogue which is almost like a journey through Italy itself. The carefully arranged programme ranges from notable operatic arias drawn from the masterpieces of Giuseppe Verdi and Gioachino Rossini, among other master composers of Italian opera. These stunning arias are matched with the perhaps more exuberant popular songs that fall under the label of the Neapolitan vocal tradition. As such, the performers are able to generate an experience that tells many tales of passion, joyfulness and poignant nostalgia in varied and compelling ways.
Each concert runs for ninety minutes and there is an intermission of approximately ten minutes. During both halves, the trained singers are accompanied by the enveloping and sonorous colour of a highly skilled pianist. The piano, an ideal instrument for such an intimately staged concert series, guides audiences on a journey that evokes the sounds of the lively streets of Naples and the more refined venues of Italy's great opera houses. Celebrating the beauty of music in all its forms, O’ Sole Mio: Neapolitan Songs and Great Opera Arias offers a true musical journey in the heart of Florence.