The old and wealthy Uberto has the young and bravado Serpina in his employ, who takes advantage of him. Uberto tells her that he would like to find a wife: Serpina offers herself to him but he refuses her. To make him jealous, she tells him that she has found a husband, a certain Captain Tempest (in reality the other servant, Vespone, disguised as a soldier). Serpina asks Uberto for a dowry of 4,000 ecus. She hopes that Uberto, refusing to pay such a sum, will eventually marry her and that she will thus become mistress of the house. Based on Giovanni Battista Pergolesi’s 1733 opera of the same name, Giovanni Paisiello’s La Serva Padrona was first performed at the court of the Russian Empress Catherine II in Carskoe Selo, St. Petersburg (where Paisiello lived in 1781). Paisiello took the libretto by Gennaro Antonio Federico and added a new aria for the protagonist and two duets.
director: Marco Zuccarini
orchestra: Orchestra del Teatro Massimo Bellini di Catania
place: TEATRO SANGIORGI
date of production: 2006
registration date: 2004
place of registration: CATANIA