Antonio Vivaldi: «L'Olimpiade» RV 725 (Opera in three acts)
Libretto by Pietro Metastasio (in an arrangement by Bartolomeo Vitturi)
First performance: Venice, Teatro Sant'Angelo, February 17, 1734
Edition: Critical edition by Alessandro Borin and Antonia Moccia (Ricordi, Milan)
Performance in Italian with German surtitles

Making the Olympic Games the subject and content of an opera may seem somewhat unusual from today's perspective. However, in 1733, this was not the case, as the career of one of the most frequently set librettos in music history began in Vienna. The plot, which was conceived by the famous Pietro Metastasio as the court poet of Emperor Charles VI, takes the following course: Clistene, King of Sicyon, was elected as the regent of the games and has invited the best athletes of Greece to a sporting competition. The winner is promised a special prize, namely the hand of his daughter, Aristea. Licida, a young man who has come from Crete and is the (supposed) son of the local king, has set his sights on Aristea, forgetting his previous lover, Argene, because of the promised reward. However, Licida has legitimate doubts about his chances of success in the upcoming events, and Megacle, a friend and potential Olympian, stands by his side. He asks him to compete instead of him. Megacle, who feels indebted to Licida (because of a rescue from an earlier life-threatening situation) and is in a secret love affair with Aristea, does not initially suspect his friend's deception and gives him his consent. Meanwhile, Argene, who was banished from her Cretan homeland to avoid an unequal marriage, found refuge in a forest near Elis, the site of the games, where she meets Aristea, who shares her views.

Less than six months after Antonio Caldara's first performance of the Metastasian «L'Olimpiade» in honor of Elisabeth Christine, the wife of Charles VI another very successful composer was heard at the Teatro Sant'Angelo in Venice with his very own version of the opera.. It was Antonio Vivaldi, who wanted to lead a «campaign to recapture the Venetian theaters» with this opera, against various representatives of the so-called «Neapolitan School». The fact that this «campaign» was based on a libretto whose author has always been one of the main representatives of that style and also relies on a vocal virtuosity in the area of the vocal line that is comparatively rare in the work of the «prete rosso» is particularly helpful for Alessandro De Marchi - his interpretations have become flagship productions of the recent performance history of Neapolitan-style opera. Together with an ensemble consisting of selected soloists, led by Raffaele Pe, Bejun Mehta, and Margherita Maria Sala, the maestro presents us with a drama about youth, physical culture, and strong emotions as the opening of his last season at the Innsbrucker Festwochen.