Dido

In the show Dido at the Belli Theater directed by Carlo Emilio Lerici, the protagonist is the queen of the Phoenician city of Tyre, widow of Sichaeus killed by her brother Pygmalion, forced to flee to Africa where she founds the city of Carthage. In the Aeneid Virgil imagines that Aeneas, having escaped the destruction of Troy with his little son Ascanio and his old father Anchises, during his long sea voyage, ends up on the beaches of Carthage due to a storm.

Welcomed with his companions by Dido, the Trojan hero is hosted in the palace and in a short time he establishes a love bond with the queen; however, when Aeneas, prompted by divine visions to resume his sea voyage to reach Italy and found a new kingdom, Dido unable to bear the pain and offense of abandonment, kills herself in a pyre whose flames are so tall to be seen by Aeneas as he sails away on the sea, cursed by the queen as a perjurer.

The show focuses mainly on the moment in which the queen knew of Aeneas' decision to leave, denying that he had ever made any promises. Dido expresses herself with a composition taken from fragments of the IV book of the Aeneid partly freely translated and partly in the original Latin. Parallel to the reciting voice develops the musical path centered on some songs taken from the collection of Arie Antiche (Ancient Airs) by Alessandro Parisotti, freely reworked for voice and electric guitar.

With Francesca Bianco and Eleonora Tosto, Matteo Bottini on guitar.

Photo credits: courtesy of the Belli Theater official site