The Bellini Theatre facing onto the square of the same name, was inaugurated on May 31st 1890 with a performance of Norma by Vincenzo Bellini.


Teatro Bellini

The realisation of this ambitious monument to music has a long and troubled history of plans and changed projects behind itself. The present building is the work of Carlo Sada (an architect trained at the Accademia di Brera and in Rome); he followed his master Andrea Scala to Catania, and eventually supplanted him in 1880.

The style of the Catanese theatre is inspired by the French eclecticism of the ‘Second Empire’ imposed in Paris by Charles Garnier with the Paris Opéra. The façade of the Bellini Theatre is loaded with ornaments and allegories; the entrance porch for carriages surrounded by iron gates is very elegant.

The concert hall inside has excellent acoustic; it has run elegant corridors and halls and the foyer where is a statue of Vincenzo Bellini.The frescoes on the ceiling are the work of Erneststo Bellandi; in 1883 Giuseppe Sciuti painted a pre curtain displaying the legendary victory of the Catanese people over the Lybians.

A theatre inside the city

One of Carlo Sada’s major concerns was to link the theatre with the surrounding urban environment: “We shall the say – writes the architect in the report to his completion plan – that both the main entrance porch and the side ones, also serve the public circulation and only on performance evenings will the circulation of carriages be regulated as best suiting the theatre service”. Besides the bridges that would have connected the edifice to the neighbouring buildings, Sada also planned a monumental arrangement of the square in front of the theatre, which should have matched the solemnity of the theatre.

He imagined placing in its centre a great monument to Vincenzo Bellini that the Town had commissioned from the sculptor Monteverde (this monument is currently found in Piazza Stesicoro): “Once the square is arranged, it’s there we would like to put the monument to the supreme master that the Municipality has commissioned  from the illustrious sculptor Monteverde, not only for the ornament that this shapeless square would acquire; but mainly by principle of logic and there fore in relation with the aesthetic concept, and, that is that the monument to the great man (Bellini) be situated in the square of the same name, where the temple devoted to him lies”.

On the tracks of Vincenzo Bellini

In this short list you will find the places of historic interest relevant to the memory of Bellini:

inside Catania Cathedral the tomb of Vincenzo Bellini can be visited;

in n°3  St. Francesco Square - inside the palazzo Gravina-Cruyllas- is the museum-home of Vincenzo Bellini. Inside the old rooms are personal belongings and manuscripts;

a beautiful marble bust of Vincenzo Bellini stands in the esplanade facing the main entrance to the Bellini Gardens -Villa Bellini-, at the crossing of via Etnea and via Umberto.


Bibliography
AA.VV., Enciclopedia di Catania, Catania 1987.
Z. Dato Toscano, U. Rodonò, Il Teatro Bellini di Catania. I progetti e la fabbrica dell’archivio dei disegni di Carlo Sada architetto (1849-1924), Catania 1990.
Guida di Catania e provincia, a c. di N. Recupero, Catania 1991.

copyright Giuseppe Maimone Publisher