Produced in the 1930s, The Flames of Paris, with music by Boris Asafiev, was presented on the eve of the anniversary of the October Revolution, and later continued to be included in the ranks of works which were always brought out for an airing on anniversaries of this sort. This is hardly surprising, The Flames of Paris is about the conflagration of the great French Revolution. It had a new 'hero' type which, up to then, had not been encountered in ballet ?EUR" one of its main characters was the populace, revolutionary in mood and ready for action.
Performed in 1981 by Rudolf Nureyev and recently added to the Bolshoi's repertoire, this rarely presented swashbuckling ballet, now sees its rebirth on the stage of the famed theatre. Re-created specifically for the Bolshoi by French choreographer Pierre Lacotte, Marco Spada , or the Bandit's Daughter is a grandiose and unique ballet both on a technical and dramatic level: complex choreography, five lead roles created for five principals, several changes in scenery, the participation of nearly all the Corps de ballet, and even the presence of animals on stage. With its scenes of pantomime, devilish intrigue, rejected suitors, kidnapping heroines, rebellion, and lovers misunderstandings, Marco Spada is a fresh and joyful ballet to discover.
The american soloist David Hallberg stars as Marco Spada with Evguenia Obraztsova, Olga Smirnova, Semion Chudin and the Corps de ballet of the Bolshoi Ballet.
Following on the success of his adaptation of the Goldberg Variations, Spoerli turned to that other Bach masterpiece, the Suites for Solo Cello, offering his abstract vision in three stunningly beautiful dance episodes.
The choreography mixes solos, pas de deux, trios and ensemble work. Beginning and ending with a near-identical solo, the cycle is dominated by circularity. The duets are virtuoso gems, athleticism made dance.
Its subtle play on balance and the relationship between bodies and light, the symmetry and asymmetry of the ensemble parts, its purity of movement and its sheer energy make this a ballet of remarkable density, depth and theatrical beauty.
The Bach Suites are played here by Claudius Herrmann, solo cellist with the Zurich Opera Orchestra, in a rendition that does full justice to their choreographic potential.
A traditional filming reproduces the perspective of an audience in its seat armed with opera glasses. This film shows just the opposite ?EUR" the spectator is placed in the orchestra among the musicians and in front of the conductor. We thus have the perspective of the musicians and the emotions they live with Cristoph Eschenbach. The effect of being in the very midst of these always surprising scores is nothing short of spectacular. For Harold in Italy , violist Tabea Zimmermann joins maestro Eschenbach and the Orchestre de Paris.
In this remarkable film, Denis Sneguirev invites us to witness the rescue and revival of Moscow's legendary Bolshoi Theatre. In a mix of 3D images, animation, documentary footage and interviews, he recounts the history of the Bolshoi from its origins to the present day. Hitherto unknown archival material takes viewers back to a time when stars like Ulanova, Maximova, Plisetskaya, Vasiliev or Grigorovich graced the Bolshoi stage. Here we watch the teams of architechts engineers and construction workers labouring day and night to rebuild the theatre in the course of a colossal venture Russia's media dubbed the "construction project of the century."
In London, a young governess is hired by the elegant and mysterious tutor of two children to supervise their education at Bly Manor, deep in the English countryside. Her employer imposes one strict condition, however: that hereafter he not be contacted under any circumstances. Assisted by an elderly housekeeper, Mrs. Grose, the young woman arrives at Bly and soon discovers that the seemingly angelic children (Miles, twelve, and Flora, eight) conceal a dark secret, namely the pernicious ghosts of two former domestics, Peter Quint and Miss Jessel, who force the children to keep the secret of their suspicious past and plan to take them under their ultimate control. This is what the Governess must face, either with the children or without them. Flora will be saved in extremis, but little Miles will perish in escaping - perhaps - from Quint's demonic clutches.
That was the big event of the Aix-en-Provence Festival 2001, The Turn of the Screw by Benjamin Britten has triumphed in a newly restored Theatre du Jeu de Paume. The production imagined by Luc Bondy extracts the essential of the libretto of Myfanwy Piper inspired by a story by Henry James. In an atmosphere reminding Hitchcock movies, where we can feel the tension, the stage director's work keep the suspense of the...
World-famous choreographer and dancer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui uses the body - movement - as the principal vehicle for is ideas. The result is there in performances, intimist or otherwise, in which the body is displayed to an audience. Here, in four different settings - Belgium, China, Corsica, India - we make the acquaintance of one of the most prolific and likeable figures on today's dance scene. In the course of interviews and excerpts from his performances Cherkaoui reveals his passion for the dance, spirituality, his childhood and his family
In granting us the rare privilege of entry, the Beijing Opera School offers access to the age-old art from of traditional Chinese opera. Based on a typical day for students and their teachers, the film lets us follow them through dawn-to-dusk activities that include acrobatics, classes in singing, music and dance, makeup sessions, schoolwork, rehearsals and performances. This is a total immersion in an establishment where discipline is, in many respects, that of a military academy.
After an absence of almost twenty years L'elisir d'amore is back at the Paris Opera in a crazy version by Laurent Pelly.
The plot is simple but effective: a shy, naive young peasant buys a love philtre from a quack - all he gets, in fact, is a flask of wine - in order to win the heart of the girl he is in love with; in the end, and with no help from the philtre, she will realise that she loves him too. Add to this a sparkling musical language and marvellously inspired melodies - including the legendary "Una Furtiva Lagrima" - and you have the authentic masterpiece Donizetti turned out in just two weeks.
Transposing the plot to the Italy of the 1950s, director Laurent Pelly offers us an absolute jewel, beautifully crafted and shot through with poetry.
The reopening show of the historical stage of the Bolshoi Theatre by Jurowski and Tcherniakov.
Ruslan and Lyudmila , the fable of Mikhail Glinka (from a poem of Pushkin), and symbolic Russian opera in itself, was an apposite choice to open the 2011-2012 of the majestic Moscow opera, after its long renovation.
Tcherniakov transposes Glinka's opera into the 21st century exposing the protagonists exposing the protagonists to contemporary forms of temptations: a harem for Ruslan, and a Thai massage for Lyudmila.
Vladimir Jurowski conducts The Bolshoi Theater Orchestra and a magnificent and soloists Albina Shagimuratova, Mikhail Petrenko, Alexandrina Pendatchanska, Charles Workman and Elena Zaremba in this production acclaimed for its musical quality and its staging.
Roberto Alagna as Orpheus in his brother David?EUR(TM)s new version of the Gluck masterpiece. A major event recorded in Bologna.
Opting for the French-language version of Gluck's Orpheus , David Alagna was faced with the task of achieving an appropriately subtle adaptation. In a plot transposed to the present day, Eurydice dies in a car accident on the day of her wedding, and Orpheus's quest for his beloved is a dream beginning and ending at the cemetery. No happy ending in this interpretation, but a new approach to characterisation: Amore, sung by a baritone, becomes a funeral parlour employee and Orpheus's guide. And Orpheus, of course, loses his loved one forever by turning to look back.
The enormously talented Roberto Alagna throws himself body and soul into this production. His incredible vitality and flawless timbre and diction make him a great Orpheus. His partner, young Italian soprano Serena Gamberoni, is simply stunning as Euridice, while French baritone Marc Barrard is suitably terrifying as the guide to the Underworld. The orchestra of the Teatro Comunale di Bologna is conducted by Giampaolo Bisanti, who masterfully brings out all Gluck's poetry, romantic melancholy and depth.
As the first collaboration ever between conductor William Christie and director Luc Bondy, this production of Hercules was the major event of the 2004 opera season. Originally Created in Aix-en-Provence in July 2004, the show then moved on to the Palais Garnier in Paris where it was recorded in December of the same year.
The Hercules received the student prize at the Golden Prague 2005.
The 70 dancers of the Igor Moiseyev Ballet take us on a journey around the world and through the regions of Soviet Union, revealing an incredible multitude of folklores, including Moldovan, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Nanai, Kalmyk, Tatar, Adjaran and Caucasian. 14 dazzling, surprising and joyful ballets, including the major works from the repertoire of Igor Moiseyev. A show acclaimed throughout the world!
A major figure on the contemporary choreography scene, Bil T. Jones is also a remarkable dance and a performer with an electrifying stage presence. Here, alone in a studio and filmed from a totally cinematic point of view, he speaks to us of violence, gentleness and emotion in three short pieces: Ionization, to music by Edgar Varese; Chaconne, from Bach's Partita for Solo Violin in D minor; and Tea for Two , the famous classic song.
Marius Petipa's exotic ballet, set in legendary and mysterious India, is a story of love, death and vengeful judgement. Yuri Grigorovich's sumptuous recreation of Petipa's choreography, with breathtaking sets and costumes designed by Nikolay Sharonov, stars Svetlana Zakharova as the Bayadere Nikiya, Vladislav Lantratov as Solor and Maria Alexandrova as Gamzatti whose alluring presence challenges Solor's love for Nikiya.
The Bolchoi Theatre Orchestra is conduced by Pavel Sorokin.
Recorded at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in June 2004, this Marriage of Figaro was unanimously acclaimed by the public and critics alike as a Mozart opera landmark.
Director Jean-Louis Martinoty brings an elegantly intelligent narrative sense to an interpretation in which the protagonists, against a backdrop of magnificent canvases of 18th-century inspiration, are dressed by Sylvie de Segonzac in a palette in which every shade is perfect. Hans Schavernoch's set suggests an elitist society that is coming apart at the seams.
René Jacobs's conducting of Concerto Köln is meticulous and perfectly balanced, offering a ravishing use of tonal colour and orchestral dynamics.
A veteran Almaviva, the excellent Pietro Spagnoli plays opposite Annette Dasch's beauteous Countess. As Figaro and Susanna, Luca Pisaroni and Rosemary Joshua are a truly sparkling couple, while mezzo Angelika Kirchschlager embodies the most divinely troubling Cherubino.
Any reprise of the Strehler Nozze di Figaro has to be a major event. And in 2010, thirty-seven years after its premiere, the work met with a fresh triumph at the Opera Bastille, featuring a new generation of performers: Ludovic Tezier as Count Almaviva, Barbara Frittoli as Countess Almaviva, Ekaterina Siurina as Susanna, Luca Pisaroni as Figaro and Karine Deshayes as Cherubino.
Filmed at the Paris Opera with Philippe Jordan as the musical director, he revealed the Orchestra and Chorus of the Opera National de Paris at the height of their powers.
The program also include bonus interview featuring Humbert Camerlo, who worked for many years with Giorgio Strehler and was the stage director for this reprise.
Child murder, scheming monks and a tsar lapsing into madness - Modest Mussorgsky spread the thematic arc wide in his choral opera, which he began to work on from 1868, and with which he attempted to awaken an awareness of his own time through the indirect route of a historic story.
As an artist of the 19th century, he was driven by the psychology of the masses. Thus, in Boris Godunov , alongside the hero of the title, the main role is actually taken primarily by the Russian people, rejoicing, starving, demanding and questioning.
With the participation of conductor Kent Nagano , catalan stage director Calixto Bieito proposes an original reading of this brilliant work. The cast leaded by Alexander Tsymbaliuk (Boris) associates Gerhard Siegel (Schuisky), Markus Eiche (Chelkalov) and Anatoli Kotscherga (Pimen).
Offenbach?EUR(TM)s Les Contes d'Hoffmann, staged by Olivier Py. High art at Geneva?EUR(TM)s Grand Théâtre!
Three fables. A man falls in love with a doll, a young woman sings herself to death and a courtesan steals her lovers' reflections. "Three women in the same woman," and the same number of stories told by Hoffmann. A picture of the cursed artist slipping through women's arms into those of his muse, under the treacherous eye of the evil one, the latter also appearing in three diabolical incarnations. Intertwining themes borrowed from the German poet, the libretto fed the composer's fantasies with material both fantastic and fanciful, sustaining his dreams that this work would one day be a triumph at the Opéra Comique. Alas, he was to die before he could see it performed.
Baroque and mystical, carnal yet metaphysical, Olivier Py's theatrical universe comes into its own when highlighting the oddities of this truly singular work.
2004 production of Prokofiev's The Love for Three Oranges, performed in the theatre of Grand Saint-Jean. The cast list suggested Larissa Gergieva's Mariinsky Theatre young singers academy had set up their summer camp in Aix to give the audience a taste of Russia's youngest singing talents.
Philippe Calvario made his debut as a theatre director. His debut didn't reveal any inexperience. He knew how to make the best use of all the possibilities the theatre offered. With an admirable dash and panache, he placed the chorus groups around, very often to hilarious effect. The cheap stage constructions and the candy-coloured costumes fitted perfectly with his slapstick approach. The sometimes sharp, sometimes burlesque music of Prokofiev invites an over-the-top approach.
Conductor Tugan Sokhiev, only 26 years old, made a favourable impression. In his conducting of the Prokofiev score, it was easy to hear that he was a pupil of Valery Gergiev. Sokhiev has the same hard-edged drive as his master, pushing for large dynamic contrasts. With the young and enthusiastic cast, this works wonderfully well.
Once upon a time was a former prima ballerina called Cinderella. After her mother's death she became a servant in the dance company of her stepmother and her two stepsisters. The invitation to a charity gala performance, which the celebrated solo dancer Frédéric will attend, looking for an equally gifted new partner, is going to change her life?EUR?
Heinz Spoerli has the great idea to turn Cinderella into a poor and wretched corps de ballet girl in a provincial company, exploited and humiliated by the wicked ballet mistress who favors her own two daughters - with the Good Fairy as a haggard rehearsal pianist. The stepmother and both stepsisters are played in drag. The stepmother, jealous of seeing Cinderella capturing the attention of the dancing master as she excels at the barre more than her stepsisters, frequently stops Cinderella from dancing.
This is the plot of Heinz Spoerli's Zurich Ballet Cinderella production filmed by Andy Sommer as a musical from Hollywood, which turned out to be a big success at its premiere and must rank as one of the danciest stagings Prokofiev's popular ballet has ever received.
Turandot from the Arena di Verona: Franco Zeffirelli's legendary production of a Puccini masterpiece.
For its 88th edition, the prestigious Arena di Verona Festival honored internationally acclaimed Italian stage director Franco Zeffirelli. Zeffirelli delivers an opulent staging of the fairy-tale story of the Chinese Princess Turandot, who will only marry a prince capable of solving her riddles.
The Russian soprano Maria Guleghina proved a brilliant Turandot. Salvatore Licitra's trump card is his imposingly radiant tenor voice of which he remains in sovereign control even in the role's much-feared highest register. The soprano Tamar Iveri is a beautiful and sensitive Liù.
The Orchestra and Chorus of the Arena di Verona are conducted by Maestro Giuliano Carella.
Presenting Petipa's extravaganza, The Pharaoh's Daughter , in a stunning production by Pierre Lacotte . Recreating the spectacular sumptuousness of the original, the ballet tells the tale of a young Englishman who dreams he elopes with a Pharaoh's daughter. Despite a desert storm, a lion hunt and an attempted suicide, the couple finally wins the Pharaoh's blessing of their marriage. From its creation in 1862, Petipa's grandiose ballet was a sensational success; its stupendous costumes and striking scenery, its exotica, romanticism and drama appealing to audiences as much as the virtuoso choreography.
The Bolshoi Ballet and the two soloists Svetlana Zakharova and Sergey Filin are at their best in spite of the difficulty of Pierre Lacotte's choreography.
Special features includes a documentary about the creation of the ballet at the Bolshoi and an exclusive interview of Pierre Lacotte.
Composed in 1931 by Dmitry Shostakovich, The Bolt ?EUR" to a book by Viktor Smirnov, is being revived for the first time in more than 70 years.
Shostakovich composed a caustically humourous ballet, blending popular tunes, serious music, circus music, waltzes, marches, tangos. He had imagined his ballet as a joyful lampoon of proletarian drama. His intention was to highlight the eventful and ambiguous relationship existing between proletarian experience and the representation given of it by the Soviet vanguard.
Alexei Ratmansky's choreography develops into a true marvel, opening with a ballet of giant robots and ending in a blood red delirious grand parade.
The starting point and destination of Heinz Spoerli's new ballet is the Magnificat by Johann Sebastian Bach .
From the beginning of the Allemande' movement of the Partita in A minor for solo flute, through the joy of Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 , this is the question of faith, which sparked Heinz Spoerli's interest in this piece.
Heinz Spoerli intensifies the emotions here, by inserting two moving arias from the cantatas Wo soll ich fliehen hin and Ich habe genug .
This is an important aspect for Heinz Spoerli in his discourse with the text of the Magnificat, in which his deep respect for all religions, or rather every faith, is not about the worship of a certain creator-figure, but more about the conditions and prerequisites of this for the expression of a profound devoutness, which also involves rejection, exclusion, uncertainty and separation.
Performed by Orchestra La Scintilla and conducted by Marc Minkowski in February 2012. In 1996 the group was founded as an independent ensemble by specialist musicians of the Zurich Opera Orchestra and soon obtained an excellent reputation. The spark that ignited the enthusiasm for new 'old music' gave its name to the ensemble: La Scintilla - The Spark. Performances with eminent authorities in the field such as Nikolaus...
The Bolshoi troupe triumphs at Paris Opera's 2008 season opening with Eugene Onegin.
Three romantic heroes each with a solitary destiny: Tatiana, a Romanesque young woman seeking absolution; Onegin, a distant dandy hiding emptiness under affected haughtiness; and Lenski, abandoned by his literary idol. Between these three, barren affections presage the inexorable social ruin.
With a stage setting as sombre as it is effective ?EUR" a great dining table appears in the middle of a salon ?EUR" the director Dmitri Tcherniakov separates two different worlds and lends the drama a clarity rarely reached.
At long last, the Staatsballett Berlin is once more dancing The Nutcracker , one of the most popular ballets ever. Vasily Medvedev and Yuri Burlaka , two Russian choreographers and connoisseurs of the tradition, have developed a version for the Staatsballett Berlin which is based on the historic stage designs and choreography from the original of 1892. The stage designs and costumes have been modeled on the historic designs, part of the treasures of the Russian ballet archives.
The choreography, which was created for Lev Ivanov's inaugural performance, is largely based on his specifications - after all, it was he who gave this ballet his unmistakable style of dancing and whose art continues to be stylistically influential even to this day.
In combination with the brilliance of modern dance, this production - a loving reconstruction designed as a great ballet feerie - reveals all of its nostalgic charm and promises the wonderful anticipation of Christmas: it's as if Pyotr Il'yich Tchaikovsky had composed the falling of snowflakes or the fragrance of Christmas spices - a piece of musical genius.
Sleeping Beauty , the mythical Tchaikovsky's ballet in a new production of the Bolshoi Ballet. Set for the reopening of the world famous historical stage completely renovated while celebrating David Hallberg's Bolshoi debut.
The choreographer, Yuri Grigorovich presents a new version of one of his most famous choreography for a breath taking experience in splendid sets designed by Ezio Frigerio and more than 400 new costumes designed by Franca Squarciapino .
The american superstar dancer David Hallberg is Prince Desire while Principal Dancer Svetlana Zakharova, well known by Parisian audience thanks to her many performances at the Palais Garnier is Princess Aurora. They are joined by a great cast such as Maria Allash as Lilac Fairy, Artem Ovcharenko as Bluebird and Nina Kaptsova as Princess Florine.
A Swan Lake for our times.
A magical version of Tchaikovsky's masterpiece by the Zurich Ballet and choreographer Heinz Spoerli.
Swan Lake for our times capable of transporting the audience to another world. The magic in the story suddenly takes hold of the viewer. Ballet is not simply a way of telling the story. Rather than gestures asking to be deciphered, the choreographer created large-scale, visionary movements closer to an artistic language of symbols and plays on the whole spectrum of human emotions. It always maintains a relationship of creative tension with its surroundings, especially the music, the poetry of the set, the use of light and colour, the texture of the costumes.
A key element of this artistic responsibility is to tell the story precisely but openly, without pinning it down, especially the ending - an ending which is in a many-facetted sense a "deliverance." Does this mean that the lovers are saved? Is the spell's power broken? Are there other kinds of salvation and deliverance? Perhaps even by death and transfiguration?
Celebrating the 85th birthday of the birth of the great Russian conductor Evgeny Svetlanov (1928-2002). This event was filmed in the magnificent room of the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory. Evgueny Svetlanov has spent 35 years leading the Symphony orchestra of the Russian Federation, today nicknamed The Svetlanov .
Conducted by Vladimir Jurowski, its new Director, the concert gathers some of the most acclaimed artists: Yefim Bronfman, Tatiana Pavlovskaya, Vsevolod Grivnov, Serguey Leiferkus.
To celebrate the bicentennial of Giuseppe Verdi's birth, La Fura dels Baus opens the "Centanario Festival 2013" of the Arena di Verona. Carlus Padrissa and Alex Olle sign a brillant new version of Aida .
Aida is the most popular opera of Verona Festival, the only one performed every year, 17000 spectators enjoy the show every evening. This new production is designed by La Fura dels Baus. They transform the arena into a huge desert, creating mechanical animals and manufacture a solar power plant. They use their experience in leading large-scale shows and opera to create the Aida of the 21st century splendidly conducted by a young talented conductor, Omer Meir Wellber .
The Egyptians have captured and enslaved Aida, an Ethiopian princess. An Egyptian military commander, Radames, struggles to choose between his love for her and his loyalty to the Pharaoh. To complicate the story further, the Pharaoh's daughter Amneris is in love with Radames, although he does not return her feelings.
Nina Stemme marks her theatrical role debut as Aida with an astounding performance in a new staging by Nicolas Joel at the Zurich Opera - sharing the stage with a star-packed cast including Salvatore Licitra, Luiciana d'intino and Juan Pons.
Bonus:
- The Story of Aida - a film by Louis Wallencan
- Interview with Andy Sommer
Coproduced with Siberia's Novosibirsk Opera, this new Macbeth uses cutting-edge multimedia technology to give the viewer a fresh perspective on the work. Google Earth satellite images plunge us into the heart of the action: a gloomy square surrounded by soulless buildings, and the interior of an aristocratic residence. Witches are no more a part of Tcherniakov's Macbeth that the duel was of Onegin , but once again the atmosphere is one of brooding claustrophobia.
Tcherniakov has chosen a great cast, beginning with the marvellous Lithuanian soprano Violeta Urmana as Lady Macbeth. Greek baritone Dimitris Tiliakos is a powerful presence as Macbeth, while the Italians Ferruccio Furlanetto (bass) and Stefano Secco (tenor) are sumptuous as, respectively, Banquo and Macduff.
In this, his second production at the Paris Opera, Teodor Currentzis, music director of the Novosibirsk Opera and Ballet Theatre conducts with verve and a splendid theatrical sense.
We all identify Traviata with the corrupt, led-astray heroine of Verdi's opera; with those women whose fatal sensuality incriminated families, threatening the social order, and compromising a morality where desire, with its subversive powers, was to be eliminated.
However, every myth benefits from a fresh perspective. And from the bedside of a repentant Madeleine, the guilty conscience of the XIXth century's hypocritical honesty, Peter Mussbach sees this myth differently. He sees it from a closer perspective. Perhaps his very contemporary vision of this past era can shed some
light on our vision of the modern woman.
The only performance from the eventful 2003 Festival d'Aix, this Traviata is carried all the way through by a radiant Mireille Delunsch, who, as always, pushes the limits of her art. Appearing in a wedding dress, evoking the sacrificed icon reminiscent of both Marylin and Lady Di, trapped by tragedy, Mireille Delunsch is Violetta.
Filmed by Don Kent, a master in the domain, Peter Mussbach's brilliant production is one long flashback, which leaves the spectator breathless. A truly remarkable director of actors, Mussbach focuses on the psychology of the opera's characters, and knows how to get the best out of his singers. For him, La Traviata is "written...
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 Garcia Gutierrez. 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.
In this biographical and musical road movie by Andy Sommer, Antoine Wagner, a young photographer living in New York, heads to Switzerland on the trail of his great-great-greand father, the renowned composer Richard Wagner .
Wagner spent several years in Switzerland - first as a political exile then as an artist who had become famous. Antoine Wagner returns to the sites where his ancestor had lived, meeting historians, musicologists, musicians and enlightened amateurs. He also sets off on a mountaineering expedition in contact with a grandiose, violent Nature, exploring those landscapes that Wagner so admired and which were a profound source of inspiration for him.
A hard-hitting new production of Kurt Weill's Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny by the Catalan collective La Fura dels Baus at the Teatro Real de Madrid.
Composed in the 1930s by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht, this is a mordant satire on capitalism and the inexorable industrialisation of a society in which the ultimate crime is not having money. In twenty scenes the authors tell the story of a city lost in the middle of a desert and run by three thugs; in Mahagonny food, sex, gambling and violence rule supreme.
The production by Alex Olle and Carlus Padrissa, both of La Fura dels Baus, combines enormous inventiveness, joy and energy with awe-inspiring ferocity.
Perfect casting brings together a group of singers - Measha Brueggergosman, Michael Konig, Jane Henschel and Willard White - who are also marvellous actors.
The Teatro Real Orchestra and Chorus are directed by young Spanish conductor Pablo Heras-Casado, who actually began his career at the Teatro Real. In November 2010, he received the El Ojo Critico prize, awarded annually to Spain's most outstanding artists in the classical music field.
