Les Contes d'Hoffmann 2024

Production of the Salzuberger Festspiele 2024. French director Mariame Clément will explore the relationship between art and real life by linking the three “tales” with individual stages of Hoffmann's biography as an artist in her production. This has decisive consequences for the female characters, or rather for the view of the images that Hoffmann projects onto Stella: the angelic but emotionally cold Olympia, who turns out to be a doll;

Cosi Fan Tutte 2023

Così fan tutte, or The School for Lovers, is the last joint opera buffa by Mozart and Da Ponte. The libretto and score were written in a month in December 1789, and the premiere took place at the end of January 1790, but the death of the Emperor interrupted the run after five performances. This Neapolitan-style comedy (the action is set in Naples!), but very much inspired by French comic opera, and in particular by Femmes Vengées composed by Philidor in 1775 to a libretto by Sedaine (which was performed in Vienna), where two women wanting to teach their husbands a lesson exchange their roles by cross-dressing… in order to seduce them and confuse them better! Twenty years later, Mozart and Da Ponte found exceptional inspiration for this comedy of manners in the spirit of Marivaux, where love, beauty and cruelty are subtly intertwined, until all hell breaks loose for some anthological moments!

Don Giovanni 2023

Don Giovanni was commissioned by the Prague Opera immediately after the success of The Marriage of Figaro: Mozart and Da Ponte wanted to build on their success and chose a subject that had triumphed just a few weeks earlier in Venice, a Don Giovanni composed by Giuseppe Gazzaniga. Revisiting the theme of the Seville Cheat – a prevalent subject in theatre since the mid-17th century, especially through Molière’s powerful incarnation, and in a ballet by Gluck in Vienna in 1761 – Da Ponte focused the work on the libertine character of Don Juan, no doubt drawing inspiration from his friend Casanova (who in fact helped make changes to Act 2, Scene 9, and attended the Prague première).

Le Nozze di Figaro 2023

Le Nozze di Figaro marked the beginning of Mozart’s collaboration with Da Ponte. At the premiere in 1786, the success was mixed in Vienna, but Prague was enthusiastic about this love imbroglio set in Seville, where the Countess and Suzanna play cat and mouse with the gentlemen, to avoid the Count’s designs on his maids… Figaro undertakes to set this little world to rights, to confound his Master while preserving the Countess’s affair with Cherubino. An infernal machine launched at full speed, which allows Mozart to produce arias of great beauty, an exceptionally determined Figaro, and reversals of situation which are the subject of brilliant ensemble numbers at the end of each act. Exhilarating!

Platée (Palais Garnier) 2022

Jean-Philippe Rameau’s Platée is a masterpiece of the French operatic repertoire and was highly regarded by critics during the composer’s lifetime. Composed for the marriage of the Dauphin Louis, son of Louis XV, to the Infanta Maria Teresa of Spain, it was first performed at Versailles in 1745 and became an instant hit. The plot revolves around the ugly and conceited frog Platée, the victim of a machination of the gods who make her believe that she is loved by Jupiter. Is this Rameau mocking Princess Maria Teresa of Spain – reputedly a woman of little beauty? Or the French court, which saw itself as a new Olympus? This classic production from the Opéra national de Paris by Marc Minkowski and Laurent Pelly returns to the stage with an entirely new cast, featuring Julie Fuchs, Mathias Vidal, Jean Teitgen and Lawrence Brownlee in the title-role.

Händel / Mozart: Der Messias 2020

Known as a creator of astonishing images, stage director and visual artist Robert Wilson delivers a magnificent production of Mozart’s adaption of Handel’s Messias. Mozart was commissioned by Gottfried van Swieten to modernise the score fifty years after Handel’s popular composition (1742), mainly by arranging the wind parts and partially re-composing them. With Marc Minkowski a conductor has been engaged who understands perfectly how to combine baroque style with the tonal possibilities of an orchestra of the classical period like the Musiciens du Louvre. The excellent soloist quartet with Elena Tsallagova, Wiebke Lehmkuhl, Richard Croft and José Coca Loza merges perfectly into Wilson’s enormous flood of images.

Requiem de Mozart 2017

Thomas: Hamlet 2016

The famous story of Hamlet and Ophelia is played out between the opposite poles of real and feigned madness, love and avenge. After the murder of his father, Hamlet opposes the marriage of his mother and his uncle, at the expense of his beloved and himself. After their unanimously acclaimed Les Huguenots in 2011, Marc Minkowski and Olivier Py are continuing their highly personal exploration of the 19th-century French Grand Opéra repertoire.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Marc Minkowski at Mozartwoche 2016

Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 23 in A major, K488 Mozart: Violin Concerto No. 5 in A major, K219 'Turkish' Schubert: Symphony No. 9 in C major, D944 'The Great' - 4th Movement Mozart: Violin Sonata No. 21 in E minor, K304: 2nd movement

Verdi: Il Trovatore 2014

After the success of Rigoletto, Verdi called on librettist Salvadore Cammarano in 1851 for his new opera Il Trovatore, based on the eponymous play by Spanish playwright Antonio García Gutiérrez. Verdi takes us to 15th century northern Spain to witness the tragic destiny of those under the control of the gypsy Azucena, who seeks to avenge the death of his mother. The first percussion notes are solemn, setting the tone for Verdi’s masterpiece, whose main themes include abandonment, passion, power, love for one’s parents and vengeance. The music is sometimes tender and sensuous, with exceptional energy and force, revealing daring and mastery in its musical and vocal language. This production marked the debut of Russian stage director Dmitri Tcherniakov at La Monnaie and the first Verdi interpretation by Marc Minkowski.

Gluck: Iphigenie en Aulide / Iphigenie en Tauride 2013

Before the Trojan War, Agamemnon gathered the Greek armies at the port of Aulis. The goddess Diane sent unfavorable winds to prevent the Greeks from sailing. Her oracle set a condition for Agamemnon: to earn the right to sail forth and destroy an innocent country, he would have to sacrifice his own daughter. Agamemnon accepted these terms and killed his young daughter Iphigénie on the altar. In his play Iphigenia in Tauris Euripides imagines that Diane plucked Iphigénie from that altar and delivered her to a temple in distant Tauride, where Iphigénie began to serve the enemy Scythians as Diane’s high priestess—all the while Iphigénie’s family believing her dead.

Alcina 2011

The setting of the opera is the enchantress Alcina's island: here by her magic powers she has created a magnificent palace in a beautiful landscape, to lure her many lovers into her power. One of these is Ruggiero, a warrior, who under Alcina's spell has forsaken his duty and his betrothed, Bradamante.

Mireille 2010

In 2009, Frédéric Mistral’s tale of love and loss in Provence came to the Opéra de Paris with a new production of Gounod’s 1864 opera Mireille. Nicolas Joel’s naturalistic staging frames the accomplished performances of Albanian soprano Inva Mula as Mireille and American tenor Charles Castronovo as her ardent country lover Vincent.

Don Quichotte 2010

This May 2010 production of Massenet's 1910 opera "Don Quichotte" marked the opera's centenary and also Jose Van Dam's operatic farewell at the Theatre de la Monnaie, Brussels. It is beautiful in every way--vocally, scenically, sonically, and visually--and a worthy record of Van Dam's farewell. Van Dam is just shy of 70 in this production, but you would never guess it from his singing or stage movements--a consummate artist. His is a noble portrayal and deeply moving. The Act V death scene is a model of beautiful singing and acting.

Mitridate Re Di Ponto 2006

The definitive version of this rare opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The costume and set design is truly visionary and other worldly and gives a convincing insight into what staged operas must have looked like during the Baroque and Rococo period. Singers are all excellent and well cast in their respective roles. One of the most thrilling things I have seen, just wish I could see this live.

Platée 2002

The prologue sets the stage for the action: Thespis, Momus and Thalie announce the subject of the play. It is a comedy mocking the folly of man...and the story of a trap set by Jupiter to cure Juno of her jealousy. The trap? It consists in convincing the water nymph Platée that Jupiter is in love with her. Mercury officially declares Jupiter’s love to Platée. When the god appears before her – first as a donkey, then an owl - the nymph calls on the birds of the marshes, but they scare Jupiter away. Luckily he quickly returns and declares his love for Platée. He even wants to marry her. La Folie comes to sing for the fiancée during an absolutely chaotic scene. However, as the couple prepares for the wedding, Juno arrives. Furious, she puts an end to the farce and ascends to the heavens with Jupiter. Humiliated, Platée understands she has been duped. She swims off into the marshes, as the chorus sings an ironic song in her honour.

Mozart: Die Entführung Aus Dem Serail 1997

The celebrated three-act opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart comes to life in this dynamic performance at the world-famous Salzburg Festival. Director Francois Abou Salem brings a modern Middle Eastern sensibility to this journey into Arabian and Muslim culture, filtering the comic tale of abduction for today's audiences. Soprano Christine Schafer portrays Constanze, a woman whose heart is torn between her fiance, Belmonte (Paul Groves), and her new master, Pasha Selim (Akram Tillawi). A sensual and resoundingly modern experience, this new interpretation casts new light on a classic musical work and infuses it with aching human emotion.