Cecilia Ligorio

INTRODUCTION

Cecilia Ligorio is an Italian stage director, dramaturg, librettist, and performer whose profound love for theatre has led her to explore diverse professional experiences, building a wide-ranging system of artistic, technical, and organizational skills that connect her multiple interests.

RECENT AND FUTURE ENGAGEMENTS

In the 2022/23 season, Cecilia Ligorio directed La Cenerentola at Oper Köln and Apollo et Hyacinthus at Teatro La Fenice in Venice. She also staged Sweet Silence in Cremona (Scarcella) at Teatro Ponchielli, Cremona. In addition, she was responsible for dramaturgy and artistic coordination for Bastarda (Donizetti Tudor cycle) at La Monnaie, Brussels, directed by O. Fredj.

In the 2023/24 season, she worked as Associate Director for Rigoletto at Teatro Massimo, Palermo, conducted by D. Oren, and at Teatro Petruzzelli, Bari, in a production conducted by R. Palumbo. She also returned to Teatro La Fenice, Venice, as Stage Director for Turandot under F.I. Ciampa.

In the 2024/25 season, Cecilia Ligorio directed Don Giovanni at Oper Köln with Tomáš Netopil conducting, and Il re pastore at Teatro dell’Opera di Roma.

Her projects in the 2025/26 season include the October premieres of Mozart’s Don Giovanni at Teatro de la Maestranza in Seville and Scarlatti’s Mitridate Eupatore at Teatro Massimo, Palermo, as well as the revival of La Cenerentola at Oper Köln.

Among her announced engagements in the 2026/27 season is the world premiere of Matteo D’Amico’s La vita nuda at Teatro dell’Opera di Roma.

BIOGRAPHY

Driven by a conscious desire to enrich her language and her artistic path, Cecilia Ligorio’s career has developed from the outset in dialogue between performing, dramaturgy, writing, and directing, spanning spoken theatre, dance theatre, and opera.

After studying music and completing her training as an actress at the “Accademia Nazionale d’Arte Drammatica Silvio d’Amico” in Rome and at the “Institut del Teatre” in Barcelona, she obtained her master’s degrees in Musical and Theatrical sciences at Statale (University of Milan). She began her career in Europe, living between Spain and Belgium for over thirteen years. Her international debut took place under the Nobel Prize laureate Derek Walcott.

In parallel, Cecilia Ligorio collaborated for more than seven years with the artistic collective If Human, resident artist at Théâtre National de Bruxelles.

She has had the privilege of serving as associate director for John Turturro and Àlex Rigola (former director of the Venice Biennale Teatro).

Her musical and theatrical training naturally led her towards opera direction, covering a repertoire from early music to the twentieth century. She has staged productions for many leading international houses and Italian theatres, including Teatro La Fenice (Venice), Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Teatro Massimo (Palermo), Teatro Regio (Torino), Teatro Ponchielli (Cremona), Teatro dell’Opera di Firenze, Teatro Verdi (Salerno), Macerata Opera Festival, Festival della Valle d’Itria, and Teatro Poliziano Montepulciano, as well as La Monnaie Brussels, Oper Köln, Opéra Royal de Liège, Théâtre de Variétés Paris, and Bare Opera New York.

Cecilia Ligorio’s curiosity for contemporary music soon led her to collaborations as librettist with composers such as Carlo Boccadoro, Giovanni Sollima, Francesco Gardella, and Pauchi Sasaki, publishing with Ricordi, Sonzogno, and Suvini Zerboni.

Her artistic research into contemporary dramaturgy also extends to re-readings of the repertoire. She has created site-specific operas (Figaro & Figaro for Bare Opera, New York), lyric videopoems (Tempo Ritrovato, Un fil di fumo), and contemporary rewritings of classics, such as Bastarda (La Monnaie Brussels), a new opera based on Donizetti’s Tudor cycle, where she participated as co-author and currently serves as artistic coordinator alongside Olivier Fredj and Francesco Lanzillotta. Increasingly, she integrates video and new technologies into her productions.

Her constant focus is to create a semantic dialogue between music, theatre, dance, and video art. Alongside her artistic career, she is also committed to teaching, having collaborated with numerous training institutions for young singers (Accademia Teatro alla Scala Milan, Fondazione Rodolfo Celletti, Showa University Tokyo) as well as Fine Arts Academies in Venice, Bari, and Macerata (involving students, for example, in the staging of Else at the Montepulciano Festival).