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Italian opera is known for its onstage melodrama, as performers belt out impassioned arias amid emotionally charged plots. But Venice’s La Fenice — one of Italy’s most prestigious opera houses — is now being engulfed by melodrama offstage too.
Its orchestra, season ticket holders and staff — in addition to classical musicians across Italy — are revolting against the theatre’s newly appointed musical director: a young woman conductor with strong ties to Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and her Brothers of Italy party.
Beatrice Venezi, 35, due to take up the prestigious four-year position next year, would be the first female musical director of La Fenice, which was founded in 1792 and where composers like Giuseppe Verdi once premiered new works. But the orchestra’s musicians claim Venezi lacks the requisite “professional profile” for such a role.
They have threatened to strike unless her nomination is rescinded. “Her curriculum vitae is not even minimally comparable to those of the great conductors who in the past held the baton,” they wrote in a public letter, warning of damage to La Fenice’s “image and credibility.” Venezi — who has also featured in television commercials for hair products and pasta — is an outspoken critic of what she describes as Italy’s male-dominated and “elitist” classical musical scene.
In 2024, she hosted a television series, Voices Out of the Chorus, about overlooked women in music history. She previously judged and co-hosted the popular San Remo music festival, which selects Italy’s entry for the Eurovision Song Contest.
But her conducting technique has been controversial among professional musicians, some of whom have criticised it as rudimentary, immature, lacking impact and failing to convey musical ideas. During a guest appearance at the Sicilian Symphony Orchestra, some musicians complained, “It would have been easier to play without her.” Online music journal Pizzicato called her a “conducting disaster”. Musicians from Italy’s main opera houses are supporting the orchestra’s demands. Fabio Luisi, the internationally renowned conductor, has urged Venezi to step back, asserting that La Fenice “is not a training ground for a young conductor.”
But Venezi — whose father once was a member of a far-right party — has powerful backers. In 2022, she appeared at Meloni’s party’s conference railing against “a political elite that doesn’t want us to enjoy the beauty of culture . . . and wants to impose a specific culture on us.” After Meloni became premier, Venezi became a government adviser on music.
Amid the furore, culture minister Alessandro Giuli has rebuffed the orchestra’s complaints as “unjustified,” calling Venezi an “an excellent artist.” Luca Zaia, president of the Veneto region, suggested, “If she weren’t a young and attractive woman, there wouldn’t be any controversy.” Yet music professionals insist it is not her youth or gender that has roiled them, but the appointment process; musicians, whose opinion and buy-in is normally essential, were not consulted. “Something illogical and unreasonable has happened,” Gianna Fratta, 52, one of Italy’s most established female conductors, told the FT. “A four-year appointment without a test before the orchestra is risky and contrary to standard practice all over the world.” Mutual respect and trust between professional musicians and their conductors are considered essential for success, and consultation is normally part of the process.
“Conducting is not only moving a wand like Harry Potter,” said musicologist Stefano Aresi, who launched an online petition against the appointment. “An orchestra is a team of highly skilled musical professionals — you cannot put them to work for years with someone they do not admire.”
For now, Venezi, who has previously claimed her conducting technique was criticised because she is not from the “leftwing cultural elite,” has retained a lawyer to “evaluate legal action” against her detractors. But the controversy seems unlikely to fade. “Orchestras just want to have good conductors,” Fratta said. “They don’t care about gender, age, politics . . . We speak only the language of music.”
