The cultivation of historically informed performance practice has been a tradition at the Zurich Opera House for many decades. In the 1970s, Nikolaus Harnoncourt caused a sensation beyond the region in the field of early music with his “Monteverdi Cycle”; in the 1980s he continued his work at the Zurich Opera House together with the director Jean-Pierre Ponnelle with Mozart (including “Idomeneo”, “Lucio Silla”, “The Abduction from the Seraglio”, “Così fan tutte”, “The Magic Flute”, “Don Giovanni”, “The Marriage of Figaro”). In doing so, Harnoncourt carried out further pioneering work, and the musicians of the Orchestra of the Zurich Opera adapted their playing techniques to the latest findings of historically informed performance practice.
From this continuum, an independent ensemble of first-class specialized musicians emerged from the Orchestra of the Zurich Opera, building an outstanding reputation. The spark that ignited the enthusiasm for new early music gave the ensemble its name: the ensemble, officially founded in 1998, adopted the name “La Scintilla – The Spark”.
In the following years, performances with leading figures of the field such as Nikolaus Harnoncourt, William Christie, Mark Minkowski, Reinhard Goebel, Giuliano Carmignola, Giovanni Antonini and Ottavio Dantone proved so successful that the Zurich Opera House has all Baroque operas—and increasingly also works from the Classical period—performed by this ensemble.
Outside the opera house, “La Scintilla” regularly appears in major concert halls and performs with renowned soloists, both instrumentalists and singers, such as Cecilia Bartoli, Rolando Villazón, Andreas Scholl and others.
In 2014, the Orchestra of the Zurich Opera received the Echo Klassik Music Award in the category “Opera Recording of the Year” (19th century) for its recording of “Norma” with Giovanni Antonini and Cecilia Bartoli. CD and DVD releases include, among others, “Mozart Arias” with Juan Diego Flórez, “Norma” and “La sonnambula” with Cecilia Bartoli, “Orlando” and “Iphigénie en Tauride” with William Christie, and “Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria” with Nikolaus Harnoncourt.
In the 2018/19 season, “La Scintilla”, in close collaboration with the violinist and conductor Ricardo Minasi, presents the four-concert “La Scintilla Series”. The musical arc stretches from the early symphonic beginnings in Italy through the great masters of the Baroque, George Frideric Handel and Johann Sebastian Bach, to the sounds of the early Giuseppe Verdi.
You can find more information on the Orchestra La Scintilla here.