The Teatro Persiani is the town's small but beautiful opera house, opened in 1840 and named for the local composer Giuseppe Persiani. The auditorium is a horseshoe of four tiers of boxes painted in white and gold, with a frescoed ceiling and a curtain depicting the Battle of Lepanto. By Italian standards it is modest in scale — fewer than five hundred seats — but acoustically and visually a small jewel.
The theatre still hosts opera and concerts through the year, including a short season tied to the Gigli Festival each summer. If there is no performance during your visit, the theatre normally opens for guided tours combined with the adjoining Gigli museum. The square outside is the central meeting-point of the town's evening life.