Opera Double Bill: Menotti’s 'Amelia al ballo' & Bernstein’s 'Trouble in Tahiti'

Italian comedy meets American satire: two marriages, two worlds - one unmissable evening. 

Our Autumn Opera Double Bill pairs the UK premiere of Gian Carlo Menotti’s sparkling comic opera Amelia al ballo with Leonard Bernstein’s Trouble in Tahiti, a sharp, jazz-inflected portrait of suburban life and marital disconnection. At first glance, these two one-act works could not be more different. Look closer, and they are in an illuminating conversation. 

Both operas are anchored by dynamic female protagonists - the scheming, irrepressible Amelia and the quietly desperate Dinah - whose desires are thwarted at every turn by the structures that are supposed to sustain them: marriage, domesticity, social expectation. Together, they offer a penetrating study of two Western cultures at a crossroads, in the 20th century, exploring the limitations and desires within a marriage. 

Amelia al ballo (Amelia Goes to the Ball)
The UK premiere of Amelia al ballo, performed in Italian, is an opera buffa at its most wickedly enjoyable. Amelia navigates a suspicious husband and a needy lover to attend the first grand ball of the season. Surprisingly, it premiered in an English translation in Philadelphia, before being staged at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. It wasn’t until 1938, two years after its first staging, that Italian audiences finally heard it in its original Italian libretto.  

Trouble in Tahiti
Bernstein paints a portrait of suburban discontent. Dinah and Sam are a young couple who appear to have landed the American dream – an immaculate house, a child and marital comforts. Yet they are deeply unhappy. Sam throws himself into the gym and the office; Dinah retreats to the cinema and her analyst's couch. With its jazz-inflected score and sardonic Greek chorus, the opera asks whether the dream being sold to a generation of Americans - built on consumerism and societal conformity - can ever be enough. 

Set in the 1950s, this new double-bill production is brought to vivid life by Guildhall's exceptional young artists under the direction of Ashley Dean. 

Amelia al ballo will be performed in Italian with English surtitles. 

Approximate running time: 2 hours, including a 20-minute interval  

Please explore the free digital programme.