Washington National Opera is celebrating its 50th anniversary season this year, at the same time as the National Symphony Orchestra marks its 75th. Last night, WNO inaugurated its golden anniversary year by the premiere of a lesser-known opera, I Vespri Siciliani (The Sicilian Vespers), by a great and justly famous composer, Giuseppe Verdi.

As an opera never mounted in the company's history, it was an odd choice, since it is neither an old-guard favorite nor of particular interest to iconoclasts. This is especially true since WNO chose the less authentic Italian translation, created after the work's Paris premiere as a French grand opera. (We have to agree with a fellow music blogger, Vilaine Fille, who was puzzled about why the Met used the Italian version last season: "I cannot fathom why a U.S. house would perform a work in something other than its original language or our local lingua franca, English.")

The WNO audience, perhaps also finally fed up with rising ticket prices, seems to have shied away, and we observed more empty seats last night than we would have expected for a 50th anniversary season premiere. Not even offers of severely reduced-price tickets to Generation O members seem to have been able to fill the house to capacity. We will see how what critics have to say in their reviews this week will impact attendance further. We still think that you people might enjoy yourselves at Vespri, if you can buy a reduced-price Generation O ticket.

Before last night, of all the singers in this cast, we were most excited about hearing soprano Maria Guleghina. Last season, we read reviews from newspapers and opera blogs in New York City about her performance in Nabucco at the Met, and she was usually described as an overwhelming vocal experience. That power was on hand last night, but Guleghina seemed uncomfortable in the role, dropping a line in the opening of the fifth act, for example, before she recovered and appearing to have trouble with her high notes at the end of the fourth. Maybe she was under-rehearsed, or over-rehearsed, but this was not a particularly rewarding performance in what is, admittedly, a very difficult role. Even so, she received a warm ovation for the famous bolero ("Mercè, dilette amiche") in Act IV, after which an Italian listener near us commented, "Finalmente, della musica!" (Finally, some music!).

Of the other lead roles, we were most impressed by bass Vitalij Kowaljow in the role of Giovanni di Procida, the leader of the Sicilian insurrection. He gave a stirring performance of one of opera's most famous arias, "O Palermo," in the second act. Like Guleghina, tenor Franco Farina (Arrigo) and baritone Lado Ataneli (Monforte) were able but not stellar. The unaccompanied quartet moments in the opera were not thrilling and a little tense. The chorus and smaller roles were all good but the whole performance was a little disjointed, responsibility for which has to be laid at the feet of company director Plácido Domingo, who was at the podium.

That brings us to the staging of this opera, which was directed by Paolo Miccichè. It was minimal as far as the set, dominated by three large picture frame pieces. This idea seems to come from a reference in the opera's second act, when Procida tries to incite a riot by leading the French soldiers to carry off pretty Sicilian girls. In that scene, he refers to a famous painting of The Rape of the Sabine Women. In his "Note from the Director" in the program, Miccichè wrote about the opera:

[The action] at other points is slowed and sublimated in musical and visual "pictures." This is why we decided to place large picture frames on stage in order to visualize this contrast between moments inside and outside the action. This duality also was the motivation behind our projection of the paintings.

We liked the picture frames, which made sense in some situations and looked silly in others. However, the fabric and scrims that kept descending and ascending were way too distracting, although some interesting images were shown on them, from a picture of the composer himself, during the overture, to paintings by 19th-century artist Francesco Hayez. Making the images revolve, like those of Palermo in the first act, is unnecessary in that it does not add to the realism of the technique, but it did aggravate our motion sickness. All this is not to say that you will not enjoy yourselves at I Vespri Siciliani, because we did, but it will not be the best opera you've ever seen.