Musical!

The proposal

A thrilling journey into the world of the musical, transcribed for piano four hands.

The musical is often wrongly regarded as the “poor relation” of opera. In reality it is a
very varied genre in which we can find genuine masterpieces.

The programme presented by the duo of Silvia Bellani and Christian Schmitz explores the fascinating world of the musical through a selection of pieces from some of the most important works of the genre.

From Chicago to Yentl, from West Side Story to A Chorus Line, the main “numbers” of each musical are arranged in virtuosic suites composed especially by Christian Schmitz. The evocation of criminal Chicago in the 1930s and of “hot” jazz is the theme of the musical Chicago by Kander and Ebb (1975), from which some famous melodies are revisited, such as All that jazz and We both reached for the gun.

In 2002 the musical was adapted into a film with Renée Zellweger and Catherine Zeta-Jones. From the soundtrack of the film Yentl, composed by Michel Legrand in 1983, comes Papa can you hear me?, which we remember in the vibrant performance by Barbra Streisand, who was both director and star of the film. West Side Story, the 1957 masterpiece by Leonard Bernstein with lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, is the love story of Romeo and Juliet transposed to the New York of the 1950s, where, amid the fighting between gangs of different ethnic backgrounds, passion is born between Tony, a young Italian-American, and Maria, a Puerto Rican girl. Two films were made from West Side Story: in 1961, directed by Jerome Robbins and Robert Wise, with Natalie Wood and George Chakiris, and again in 2021, directed by Steven Spielberg.

Alongside the original work on musical themes, we wanted to pay tribute to the genre of the Romantic transcription of operatic themes, which takes us back to the period of opera’s greatest popularity.

In particular, you will hear an entertaining – and very virtuosic – Grand Duo on themes from The Barber of Seville, c. 1868, by Henri Herz (a pianist-composer very well known in the mid-nineteenth century), which reworks themes from Rossini’s Barber of Seville. To conclude, we wanted to pay homage to one of the most iconic musicals with more modern writing.

A Chorus Line, conceived by Michael Bennett and written by Marvin Hamlisch (music) and Edward Kleban (lyrics) in 1975, tells of an audition for the dance ensemble of a Broadway show. The joys, disappointments, aspirations and disillusions of the aspiring dancers intertwine in an ensemble musical, rich in beautiful themes and highly spectacular.

This masterpiece too was adapted into a film, in 1985, directed by Richard Attenborough and starring Michael Douglas.

Performers

Silvia Bellani

MusicianPianoShe trained at the Como Conservatoire, graduating under Roberto Stefanoni with full marks and honours. She then continued her studies at the Accademia di Musica di Pinerolo with Maestro Franco Scala and at the Centro Studi…

Christian Schmitz

MusicianPianoBorn in Milan, he graduated in piano from the Conservatoire of his home city under Maestro Sergio Lattes. He then furthered his studies with Maestro Boris Petrushansky, Prof. Nelly Ben-Or and Prof. Maria Luisa Franco, graduating…