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ABOUT
The Italian conductor Rico Saccani won top prize in the Herbert von Karajan International Conducting Competition in Berlin in 1984. Before that he studied at the Summer Academy at Fontainebleau where he worked with legendary pedagogue Nadia Boulanger. He performed over 300 piano recitals from 1974–1978 and appeared as soloist with the San Francisco Symphony, Vienna Symphony Orchestra, the London Royal Philharmonic and other leading international Orchestras. He graduated with honors from the Graduate program at the University of Michigan and participated in the famous Tanglewood Summer Academy for young conductors where he worked with Leonard Bernstein, Andre Previn, Seizi Ozawa and Gustav Meier. It was during a seven-year apprentice internship with Italian conductor Giuseppe Patane, that Saccani won top prize in the 1984 Herbert von Karajan International Conducting Competition in Berlin. Saccani was immediately engaged to perform with the Berlin and Stuttgart Radio Orchestras, the Royal Danish Philharmonic and the Spoleto Festival. His opera debut came in 1985 in Verdi’s Un Giorno di Regno at the Teatro Filarmonico di Verona, La Traviata at the Paris Opera, Lucia di Lamermoor, Traviata, Butterfly and Boheme at the Vienna State Opera, Il Turco in Italia at the Rossini Festival in Pesaro plus La Bohème at the Philadelphia Opera with Luciano Pavarotti for the PBS American television network.
Saccani has also appeared at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, the Hamburg State Opera, the Lyon Opera, the Monte-Carlo Opera, the Arena de Nîmes Festival, the Opéra Comique in Paris and with companies in Rome, Dresden, Genova, Naples and Cologne. From 1985 to 2004 Saccani served as Principal Guest conductor of the Hungarian State Opera which included new productions of Macbeth, Ballo in Maschera, Manon Lescaut, Nabucco, Andrea Chenier, La Gioconda, Cavalleria Rusticana/Pagliacci, Norma and was highlighted by Verdi Marathon to celebrate the 2000 Millenium where he conducted seven different operas in 9 days. He returned to New York’s Carnegie Hall and Washington’s Kennedy Center that same year with the Iceland Symphony as their Music Director during their North American tour.
Saccani made his Metropolitan Opera debut in Il trovatore and was re-engaged for the first international radio broadcast of Traviata and Aida. He also conducted at the Teatro San Carlo (Naples), the Arena di Verona (Rigoletto), the Houston Grand Opera (Trovatore), the Puccini Festival Torre del Lago (Turandot), the Teatro Bellini di Catania (La Favorita and I Puritani) as well as the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, the Avenches Swiss Festival (Rigoletto and Nabucco) and the Santander Summer Music Festival in Spain.
From 1996 to 2005 he was also Music Director and Artistic Adviser of the Budapest Philharmonic. Other orchestras with whom he has collaborated with include the Tokyo Yomiuri Symphony, the Munich Bayerische Rundfunk, the Franz Liszt Chamber Orchestra, the Czech Philharmonic, the Irish National Symphony, the Tokyo Philharmonic, the Oslo Philharmonic, the Madrid RTE and Bilbao Orchestras, the Gurzenisch Orchestra (Cologne), the Orchestre de chambre de Genève (Geneva Chamber Orchestra), the Hungarian National State Philharmonic, the Mannheim National Theater Orchestra, the Marseilles Opera Orchestra and many others. In 2005 he was the first foreigner to receive Hungary’s Legion of Honor award in recognition of “distinguished contributions to Hungary’s cultural life for over twenty years”. His discography is comprised of over 100 recordings (Spotify and iTunes). He is currently Conductor Emeritus of the Guiyang Symphony Orchestra in China and made his China National Opera (NCPA) debut in both 2019 and 2020 Barbiere di Siviglia and Trovatore.
Collaborating Artists
Alexandru Agache
Roberto Alagna
Simone Alaimo
Stefano Algeri
Lucia Aliberti
(Sir) Thomas Allen
Jaime Aragall
Francisco Araiza
Vladimir Atlantow
Gabriel Bacquier
Bruna Baglioni
Fedora Barbieri
Cecilia Bartoli
Lando Bartolini
Eva Batori
Beaux Arts Trio
Carlo Bergonzi
Rockwell Blake
Paata Burchuladze
Renato Cappechi
Piero Cappucilli
Silvano Carroli
Giovanna Casolla
Phillippe Cassard
Jean-Phillippe Collard
Paolo Coni
Alessandro Corbelli
Firoenzo Cossotto
Carlo Cossutta
Iliana Cotrubas
Michelle Crider
Alberto Cupido
Enzo Dara
Barry Douglass
Peter Dvosrky
Salvatore Fisichella
Alfredo Kraus
Alicia De Larrocha
Mariella Devia
Larissa Diatkova
Ghena Dimitrova
Luciana D’Intino
Barry Douglas
Susan Dunn
Peter Dvorsky
Valeria Esposito
Alain Fondary
Vladimir Galouzine
Cecilia Gasdia
Paolo Gavanelli
Bonaldo Giaiotti
Marcello Giordani
Denyce Graves
Edita Gruberova
Maria Guleghina
Jerry Hadley
Thomas Hampson
Yasuko Hayashi
Stephen Isserlis
Fiamma Izzo D’Amico
Kristjan Johansson
(Dame) Gwyneth Jones
Raina Kabaivanska
Jean-Phillippe Lafont
Luis Lima
Pilar Loringar
Gyorgina Lukacs
Niccola Martinucci
Eva Marton
Denis Matsouev
Sabine Meyer
Erica Miklosa
Sherrill Millnes
Aprile Milo
Leona Mitchell
Vasile Moldoveanu
James Morris
Gerry Mulligan and his jazz quartet
Judith Nemeth
Leo Nucci
Kun Woo Paik
Luciano Pavarotti
Paul Plishka
Laszlo Polgar
Juan Pons
Bruno Praticò
Ruggiero Raimondi
Katia Ricciarelli
Alberto Rinaldi
Andrea Rost
Kurt Rydl
Gloria Scalchi
Roberto Scandiuzzi
Dimitri Sitkovetsky
Diana Sovviero
Cheryl Studer
Sharon Sweet
Ilona Tokody
Natalia Troitskaya
Maxim Vengerov
Julian Lloyd-Weber
Dolora Zajick
Giorgio Zancanaro
Franco Zeffirelli
Pinchas Zuckerman
Collaborating Ensembles
Among those with whom Saccani has performed are:
American Symphony Orchestra (New York City)
Bavarian Radio Orchestra (Munich)
Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra
Budapest Philharmonic
Hungarian State Opera Orchestra
Houston Grand Opera Symphony Orchestra (Houston Symphony)
Irish National Opera Orchestra (Dublin)
Metropolitan Opera Orchestra (New York City)
Monte-Carlo Opera Orchestra
Moscow Symphony (Puccini Festival, Torre del Lago Italy)
Oslo Philharmonic
Paris Opera Orchestra
Rome Opera Orchestra
Royal Philharmonic of Denmark (Copenhagen)
Stuttgart Radio Orchestra
Tokyo Philharmonic
Vienna State Opera Symphony Orchestra (Vienna Philharmonic)
Yomiuri (Tokyo) Symphony Orchestra
Guiyang (China) Symphony Orchestra
Critical Acclaim
"Rico Saccani secures a convincingly Italianate performance of Aida..........one of the most desirable of the currently available recordings."
-Charles Osborne
Recordings
Selected discography (incomplete)
Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra
Schumann: Symphony #4 - Cello Concerto (Tamas Varga, solo) - Manfred Overture
Dvořák: Symphony #9 ("From the New World") -- Scherzo Capriccioso
Tchaikovsky: Symphony #1 ("Winter Dreams") - Prokofiev: Piano Concerto #3 (Kun-Woo Paik, solo)
Rimsky-Korsakov: Capriccio Espagnol — Bartók: Hungarian Sketches — Vaughan Williams: Fantasy on a theme by Thomas Tallis - Erkel: Festival Overture
Gershwin: An American in Paris — Copland: Rodeo Suite — Barber: Adagio — Bernstein: Symphonic dances from West Side Story
Dvořák: Symphony #8 --- Khachaturian: Violin Concerto (Livia Sohn, solo)
Kodály: Hary Janos suite --- Bartók: Concerto for Orchestra
Beethoven: Symphony #3 ("Eroica") - Prokofiev: Symphony #1 ("Classical")
Respighi: The Pines of Rome - Roman Festivals, The Fountains of Rome
Mussorgsky: Pictures at an Exhibition - Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherazade
Orff: Carmina Burana
Cilea: Adriana Lecouvreur (Maria Temesi, Alberto Cupido, Cleopatra Ciurca, Lorenzo Saccomani)
Donizetti: Lucia di Lammermoor (Inga Nielsson, Piero Cappuccilli, Giorgio Lamberti) / Messa di Gloria / La Favorita (Denyce Graves, Salvatore Fisichella, Paolo Coni, Dimitri Kavrakos)
Giordano: Andrea Chenier (Kristjan Johansson, Maria Guleghina, Bela Ferencz)
Leoncavallo: I Pagliacci (Vladimir Atlantov, Natalia Troitskaya, Alexandru Agache)
Mascagni: Cavalleria rusticana (Galina Savova, Piero Cappuccilli, Vasile Moldoveanu)
Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro (Janet Perry, William Stone, John Cheek)
Ponchielli: La Gioconda (Maria Guleghina, Kristjan Johannsson, Bela Perencz, Judit Nemeth)
Verdi: Otello (Kristjan Johansson, Ilona Tokody, Sherrill Milnes, Antonio Marcenò)
Verdi: Falstaff (Alberto Rinaldi, Patricia Schuman, Andrea Andonian, Ned Barth, Kathleen Kuhlmann, Eva Batori, Istvan Kovachshazi)
Verdi: Un ballo in maschera (Giorgina Lukacs, Peter Kelen, Anatolij Fokonov, Zsusa Csonka)
Verdi: Aida (Wilhemina Fernandez, Bruno Sebastian, Barbara Dever, Mark Rucker)
Verdi: Rigoletto (Leo Nucci, Mariella Devia, Marcello Giordani)
Verdi: Macbeth (Yasuo Horiuchi, Giorgina Lukacs, Attila Kiss)
Verdi: La traviata (Diana Soviero, Jerry Hadley, Brian Schexnayder)
Verdi: Il Trovatore (Vyacheslov Polozov, Sharon Sweet, Dolora Zajick, Alexandru Agache)
Verdi: Un Giorno di Regno (Alessandro Corbelli, Enzo Dara, Nelson Portella, Luciana D'Intino, Krystyna Rorbach, Paolo Barbacini
Puccini: Turandot (Ghena Dimitrova, Kristjan Johansson, Katia Ricciarelli, Paata Burchuladze)
Puccini: Manon Lescaut (Ilona Tokody, Peter Kelen, Lajos Miller)
Puccini: La Bohème (Luciano Pavarotti, Veronica Kinsces, Sandor Sòlyom-Nagy, Madeline Reneè, Laszlo Polgar)
Puccini: Tosca (Giorgina Lukacs, Paul Lyon, Ned Barth)
Puccini: Madama Butterfly (Raina Kabaivanska, Nicola Martinucci, Paola Romanò, Franco Giovine )
Rossini: Il Barbiere di Siviglia (Dalibor Jenis, Gloria Scalchi, Benjamin Brecher, Edward Crafts, Alberto Rinaldi, Judith Nemeth)
Rossini: Il Turco in Italia (Simone Alaimo, Bruno Praticò, Valeria Esposito, Robert Swensen)
Honors
2005 Legion of Honor (Hungary) for "distinguished contributions to Hungary's cultural life for over 20 years"
Other Groups & Recordings
National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland & Rico Saccani
Verdi: Aida (Maria Dragoni, Kristjan Johannsson, Barbara Dever, Mark Rucker)
National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland & Rico Saccani
Respighi: Ancient Airs and Dances suites 1, 2 and 3
Anatoli Fokonov, Gianni Mongiardino, Marta Szucs and Rico Saccani
Bellini: I Puritani (Marta Szucs, Gianni Mongiardino, Anatoli Fokonov)
Piano Youtube
Sousa-Horowitz: "Stars and Stripes Forever"
Liszt: Totentanz for Piano & Orchestra
Brahms: Piano Concerto #2, Op.83 (2nd mvmt.)
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tiRGzEAmHdIv=BvzNi89WEX8
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMS8xnNwmz4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9mEnfBUgO8k
Photos
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