Teatro del Giglio

On November 10th 1672 the Council of the Republic of Lucca, in order to meet the increasing interest for the opera, in a town with a flourishing trade as Lucca, decreed to open a public theatre adapting an old convent.
Since then two opera seasons were staged in the Public Theatre: one at Carnival and the other in Autumn followed by prose performances.
An appropriate office was installed for administrative matters and for the maintenance of the theatre which worked until 1799 when Lucca lost its independence and submitted to the French domination.


Renamed Teatro Nazionale, according to the French style, the theatre suffered a period of crisis, solved by Maria Luisa Borbone, new sovereign of Lucca after the Congress of Vienna.
Completely restored on the project of the architect Giovanni Lazzarini, it received the name "Teatro del Giglio", chosen by Maria Luisa Borbone, in honour of the lily flower which stands on the coat of arms of the Borbone; it was solemnly inaugurated on 17th August 1819.
Since then, the elegant theatre with its noble neo-classic prospect has welcomed the best singers and the most important operas of the greatest authors of the Italian melodrama.
In 1985 Teatro del Giglio has received the nomination of "Teatro di Tradizione" conferred by the Ministero dello Spettacolo.

Il progetto "Puccini oltre la scena"
"Puccini oltre la scena" is the first section of the project "Puccini in 20th century 1999 - 2002", subdivided into four annual theatricals reviews, elaborated and organized by the Teatro del Giglio, the municipality of Lucca and the Centro Studi Giacomo Puccini.
The project aims to link the name of the famous composer to Lucca in a national and international prospective.
The first theatrical review, started on 6th October 1999 with the concert of the Orchestra Filarmonica della Scala directed by Riccardo Muti, and was followed by two others important events and the Berlino Orchestra directed by Christian Thielemann and the Messa with 4 hands directed by Michel Corboz ended on 2nd February with the lyric concert held by Rajna Kabaiwanska "One hundred years of Tosca",organized in occasion of the centenary of the first representation of the opera.
On the same day the exhibition dedicated to the Centenary took place and it will last to the end of February. The next three parts of the program include, in the next three years 2000-2002, the performances of Trittico, La Fanciulla del West, e Turandot, followed exhibitions, meetings and publications.

Il centro studi Giacomo Puccini
The Centro studi Giacomo Puccini was founded in 1996 in Lucca, the native town of Giacomo Puccini.
It aims to promote every kind of research on Puccini and his town milieu, on the music of that time and on the opera theatre after him. It also intends to collect and to catalogue every kind of source-original, photocopy, or electronic form - such as letters, musical and literal sketches, copies of signatures, print scores, in their different versions to furnish the men of culture and his fans with a rich library of all the publications on the artist produced in the world; and the richest bibliographical material.
The purpose of the centre is to cooperate with all those who work on the stage, particularly in theatres that perform the operas of Puccini.
The collocation of the centre, in Teatro del Giglio, depends on the close collaboration between the two institutions in projects on the personality and works of Puccini.