My name is Italia (Mi chiamo Italia)

My name is Italia (Mi chiamo Italia)

A music theatre show about Italy, for Italians by birth, and Italians by choice.

Italy tells her own story, in words and music.

 

Carla Regina  Voice, script, performance 

Jennifer Lewis live sketching

Antonio Alemanno  Arrangements, cello, double bass

Emiliano Roca:  Arrangements , guitar

Michela Mazzeo Timmer/Voice, Actually Costumes

Michela Mazzeo Timmer  Stage props

Carla Regina  Concept, Direction

Production Voice, Actually!  FOUNDATION

The show

Carla Regina in a new music theatre concept with Italy as main inspiration and theme.

The story of this country, told by Italy itself in music and words. and live sketching.
On stage, the singer/performer , the live sketching illustrator  Jennifer Lewis, and two musicians: Antonio Allemanno, cello and double-bass and Emiliano Roca, guitar.

“Mi chiamo Italia“ (My name is Italy) is the story of Italy, told by Italy itself.

Looking back at its rich and glorious past, Italy takes us through it, victories,  failures, people, places.

A tale full of iconic milestones of Italy’s history, a tale which sounds familiar to Italians and lovers of Italy and Italian culture.

The story, as usually happens in Carla’s projects, is enriched  by a versatile repertoire full of classics of Italian music : Giuseppe Verdi, Fabrizio  De Andre’, Antonio Vivaldi, Renato Zero.

The total picture on stage is enhanced by the live sketching by Jennifer Lewis. Her illustrations describe  the emotions and the situations of the music and the story.

 

A musictheatre show about Italy, for Italians by birth, and Italians by choice.

MY NAME IS ITALIA GALLERY

Alleen maar een stem (Just a voice)

Alleen maar een stem (Just a voice)

Alleen maar een stem (Just a voice) -Lockdown unplugged

Stories written during the lockdown. Stories that need to be told, sung by people who need to be heard, “people who deserve a voice”. Stories about loneliness and togetherness. About fear, hope and face masks. Sad stories, but also funny stories. Like real opera: Stories taken from real life, with real emotions from real people from Woerden.

Concept editing script and direction Carla Regina

Custums and jewerly  Michela Mazzeo Timmer

Production Voice, Actually!

ALLEEN MAAR EEN STEM GALLERY

Naked

Naked

“I knew that the time would come …the title says it all. Naked. Can I make it? “

A singer, a piano, and some rice paper lamps.

The show starts with an opera hit, and it looks like an opera concert with a regular opera singer. Carla Regina

Slowly but surely, Carla diva disappears and Carla woman takes center stage, a woman that sings and is crazy about telling stories.

With the help of rice paper lamps, images , sounds and memories, she tells those stories.

Stories of a woman between two nations, two different cultures, the old traditions of Puglia, Italy and her life in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

A woman between today and yesterday, memories en hopes.

Stories of identity, loneliness, longing and belonging, a human journey called migration.

Stories of an artist that can not be easily labelled : singer , pianist and storyteller.

Italian folkmusic, dutch songs, opera arias, and videoart in a universal story of connecting, disconnecting, strength and vulnerability.

“And if I am different, it doesn’t matter, really. I have myself, different, special, naked”.

 

 

NAKED GALLERY

On a Journey (In viaggio)

On a Journey (In viaggio)

“New horizon…bittersweet nolstalgia…secret corners of our soul…the many lights we seek, the many shadow we evoke…” A show about a journey…in and out ourselves”

 

“..In Viaggio” is a music theatre show about the different faces of a journey: adventure, migration, identity and the inner path. It is a show on the people one meets and the places one discovers; on what one is forced to abandon and leave behind,home, friends, family; and on the path that starting with a journey leads to the most important destination: our soul, our true home. Two people meet each other in a distant place while travelling. One is a woman,(western…not western? Where is she coming from? We will never know) she is running away from her country, her past is painful, and she is looking for shelter and emotional support; the other is a western well-to-do leisure traveller, and apparently his easy life is all about adventure and pleasure and no worries. They start sharing their different stories, their past and their feelings every time they meet again. While being together they start to feel at home and connected with each other. At some point the roles and the clichés are not that clear anymore: The emotional refugee, who has gained strength from surviving her ordeal, is able to become herself shelter for the man, whose unexpected confession reveals a deep struggle with his inner demons. At the certain moment, they will have to part for good enriched from each other. They will learn from this experience that the most important destination is within them. “In Viaggio” starts as a pilot project in the theatre Het Klooster in Woerden, NL, in 2010. It has been since performed throughout Holland, and Italy. It has been since performed throughout Holland, and Italy. Artistic team The show is performed  with text ,poetry, classical music and folk music, by an actor, a classical/folk singer, and a classical pianist/folk accordeonist. In Viaggio RepriseIn Viaggio A5REPRISEhigh Carla Regina Concept, Text, Dramaturgy, Voice Bert Wagenaar van Kreveld Text, Dramaturgy, Acting Nettie Krull Piano, Accordeon Jaap van der Woude Lighting Design 
Marjo van der Pol Stage Costumes Guido Grossi Make-up Miranda Lakerveld Direction Musical Repertoire The music repertoire is chosen with the clear intent to accompany and underline the story, disregarding any continuity in a cross-over of style, period and language, to resemble the idea of travelling and wandering from place to place, from people to other people, from language to language,from culture to culture. Therefore the singing voice is used in different ways (classical, folk) and the pieces are specially arranged for the performance for piano and accordeon. Classical music: Canto negro – Xavier Montsalvatge; Cancion +Seguidilla murciana – De Falla; Selve amiche – Antonio Caldara; Auf dem flusse-Frans Schubert; Ich bin der Welt – Gustav Mahler- It aint necessarily so-G. Gerswhin; Folk: Amara terra mia – Domenico Modugno; Tammurriata nera – trad folk south of Italy; Lacrime napulitane – trad. South Italia; Gracias alla vida – Violetta Parra; Black is the colour – spiritual traditional; Nature boy – Eden Ahbez.

Preludiando (Theater Concert)

Preludiando (Theater Concert)

Carla Regina: concept, text, staging, voice

Maria Gabriella Bassi: concept, piano

Claudio Mastrangelo: cello

Music by:

J.S. Bach, D. Kabalevski, B. Maderna L. Bernstein, N.Rota, G.Yared, T. De Carolis

Production Stichting “Voice, Actually” in collaboration with:  Istituto italiano di cultura -Amsterdam, NL

The show

Pre-ludiando is based on the idea of awaiting for something.

In music what comes before the main musical piece is described as prelude.

Pre-lude, in its latin origin, means : before the playing, before the game begins.

What happens while waiting to play, waiting for the game to start, waiting for someone to come?

Is the “playing” itself what makes our life worth living, or is it perhaps…the waiting itself?

2 musicians, a pianist and a cellist, a singer/theatre maker and 2 composers, worked on this theme using the tools they are familiar with their instruments, the music, the text. 

The result is a theatre concert who alternates music, words and movements.

 

Music

The repertoire of this theatre concert is very versatile:

– “Preludes” of the classical music repertoire (Kabalevski, Bach)

– Contemporary music pieces of composers such as Bruno Maderna , Leonard Bernstein, Nino Rota .

– Premieres of pieces written for this project:

  • Percorsi di luce” by Gabriel Yared

(Oscar award for the soundtrack of “The english patient”

(Oscar  nomination for the soundtrack of “City of angels”, “The talented mr. Ripley”, Cold Mountain”)

  • Preludiando-Racconti di fatti” by composer Tiziana De Carolis

        

Story

Using as inspiration the theatre play : “Waiting for Godot” by S. Beckett the performers come on stage, waiting for someone or something who will come , or that will happen.

They encourage each-other with the mantra :

“Let’s wait. Let’s listen. Let’s wait.”

In the meanwhile this waiting becomes melody, text, movement.

Classic pages of the repertoire are performed, and the theme gives them a good reason to perform new and brand new music, while everything unfolds.

They sing, play, move, waiting for a meal, for the wedding day, for the perfect soulmate, for a child.

Situations that, human as they are, will appeal to the audience, that becomes herself involved in this awaiting-prelude.

At the end we realize that the true , satisfying experience is to taste and enjoy fully the waiting time.

We wait ,and we go on living in the best way they know how , with their music.

And it is this waiting, that makes all the playing…worth playing.

“We are glad. (Silence).”

“And now that we are glad, what do we do? (Silence) “

“We wait. We listen. We wait “.