Milan's La Scala is the most loved opera house in Italy for the quality, perfection and inventiveness of its productions, according to a poll of leading Italian critics.
The poll will be published in Classic Voice magazine which is issuing a special edition Thursday dedicated to the inauguration that night of the La Scala season, with Franco Zeffirelli's production of Giuseppe Verdi's Aida.
The second favorite opera house was the Teatro Comunale in Florence followed, respectively, by Venice's La Fenice, San Carlo in Naples and Genoa's Carlo Felice, while Bologna's Teatro Comunale and Turin's Regio tied for the fifth position.
Rome's Teatro dell'Opera, on the other hand, did not even make the list.
According to Sandro Cappelletto, a critic for the Turin daily La Stampa, the Rome opera house did not make the grade "because of its lack of respect for the public and season ticket holders, the lack of information and, last but not least, its programme, which has yet to be made public".
The critics quizzed in the poll were (their newspaper or magazine in parentheses): Enrico Girardi (Corriere della Sera), Michelangelo Zurletti (La Repubblica), Sandro Cappelletto and Giangiorgio Satragni (La Stampa), Carla Moreni (Il Sole 24 Ore), Mario Messinis (Il Gazzettino), Alfredo Gasponi (Il Messaggero), Paolo Petazzi (L Unita'), Elvio Giudici (Diario), Giorgio Gualerzi (Famiglia Cristiana), Andrea Estero (Classic Voice), Roberto Mori (L' Opera), Alberto Mattioli (Musica), Mauro Mariani (Il Giornale della Musica).
