The Italian Girl in Algiers

Boston audiences will experience Rossini’s rarely performed-live comic masterpiece, The Italian Girl in Algiers as Boston Midsummer Opera (BMO) presents its 2011 production. The production is sung in English and performed with orchestra. Music director and nationally acclaimed conductor Susan Davenny Wyner will lead the fully staged and costumed production, with Sandra Piques Eddy in the role of Isabella.

Directed by Drew Minter, The Italian Girl in Algiers (L’Italiana in Algeri) combines Rossini’s fast-paced comic energy with elegant melodies delightfully orchestrated. Composed in less than 3 weeks when Rossini was 21, The Italian Girl in Algiers is a tale of manipulation and love. The Turkish Bey, Mustafa, is bored with his wife, Elvira, and his submissive harem. Desiring a new challenge to his virility, Mustafa decides that, in Elvira’s place, he wants an Italian woman. The Italian woman selected is the shipwrecked Isabella, who has other plans in mind, especially when she discovers that her lost love, Lindoro, has been enslaved by Mustafa. Armed with only her feminine wiles, Isabella must outwit Mustafa for her future and her love.