Swedish soprano Iréne Theorin gives an impressive role debut as Elektra, just as Wagner singer Waltraud Meier as Klytämnestra. They are complemented by Eva-Maria Westbroek’s Chrysothemis and René Pape’s Orest. In his interpretation of Strauss’ one-act masterpiece, conductor Daniele Gatti explores the radical side of the Expressionist score, while not neglecting the late 19th-century lyricism either. His musical vision harmonizes perfectly with the forbidding atmosphere conveyed by director Nikolaus Lehnhoff and his set designer.
Bayreuth Festival 2025: Die Meistersinger
The Bayreuth Festival’s annual new production is one of the most eagerly awaited events of the operatic calendar, and in 2025 Matthias Davids brings his experience as a multi-award-winning director of musical theatre to Wagner’s only mature comedy, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. This highly anticipated staging is matched by a superb musical line-up, with Daniele Gatti conducting an international cast including Georg Zeppenfeld as Hans Sachs, Michael Spyres as Walther von Stolzing and the young Swedish soprano Christina Nilsson as Eva. All in all, it promises to be a fresh and revitalizing take on this most inspiring of Wagner’s works, which asks fundamental questions about art, inspiration and what it means to be truly creative.
Tristan und Isolde
This production of Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde, directed by Pierre Audi, has received high acclaim in Paris and Rome. “Pierre Audi is one of the few directors who works with Wagner by subtraction, imagining the story in a minimalist dimension, out of time, abstract: … Don’t miss it.“ (Il Messagero). „The Orchestra of Teatro Opera of Rome proves with this interpretation that it is one of the best opera house orchestras in Europe.“ (KlassikInfo.de) “Ecstasy, emotion and effect unleashed by Daniele Gatti at the podium of the Orchestra was overwhelming.“ (News.at). “Excellent Andreas Schager as Tristan, vocally strong Rachel Nicholls as Isolde.“ (KlassikInfo.de). “Brilliant! Gatti is a supreme Wagnerian, gloriously aware of all the kinesthetic requirements. Schager is convincing, Nicolls among the great Isoldes I’ve heard. If your ambition is to increase your understanding of Tristan, beg, borrow or steal a ticket.” Jack Buckley, SEEN AND HEARD
Falstaff
“Everything in this world is a joke,” says Falstaff, and these words are truly given weight by Ambrogio Maestri, one of the finest Falstaffs of our time. The Italian baritone brings a powerful, versatile voice to his role, but also brings to his character a hilarious buffo quality. Daniele Gatti, one of the most acclaimed opera conductors working today, leads a stunning cast of singers, including Barbara Frittoli as Alice Ford. Genuinely warm italianità in all of the music-making, combined with a boisterous production by stage director Sven-Eric Bechtolf, turns Verdi’s commedia lirica into a fireworks display of high spirits as well as what the Neue Zürcher Zeitung called “musically and dramaturgically a feast of life and of love of life”.
RCO: Gatti conducts Bruch & Mahler
Chief conductor Daniele Gatti and star violinist Janine Jansen unite in Max Bruch’s First Violin Concerto, a warm-blooded work which fits Jansen like a glove. Listening to the concerto, with its sweetly flowing melodies and blazing solo passages, one would never know that it took Bruch four years of frustration to write. Almost immediately after it was premiered, it was considered one of the most popular violin concertos in the repertoire. Daniele Gatti and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra are pursuing their Mahler series with the First Symphony. At the premiere in 1889, the audience was ill-prepared for Mahler’s bold orchestration, but the symphony gradually gained in popularity. The Concertgebouw Orchestra, conducted by the composer himself, gave the Dutch premiere in 1903. Mahler was absolutely delighted, exclaiming, ‘The musical culture in this country is stupendous! The way the people can just listen!’ PROGRAM: Bruch: Violin Concerto; Mahler: Symphony No. 1
RCO: Gatti conducts Beethoven & Brahms
Outstanding German violinist Frank Peter Zimmermann, who has been performing regularly with the RCO since 1990, collaborates once more with Daniele Gatti to great acclaim. Within the lush, energetic melodies of Beethoven’s immensely popular Violin Concerto the solo violinist showcases his artistry. Under Gatti’s guidance, “the coordination between orchestra and soloist is especially fine” (Bachtrack). It is followed by Brahms’ First Symphony. It took Brahms at least 14 years to complete it, as he battled self-doubt, when comparing it to Beethoven’s symphonies. The audience, however, gave the work the highest praise by dubbing it “Beethoven’s Tenth”. Gatti gives the score a reading of high drama, leading the RCO to a most convincing finale. “In an onslaught of inspiration, all musicians climbed to a level you rarely hear … An unforgettable evening!” (Het Parool). PROGRAM: Beethoven: Violin Concerto; Brahms: Symphony No. 1
RCO: Gatti conducts Wagner, Liszt and Berlioz
Daniele Gatti conducts the RCO in a special concert celebrating three Romantic heroes of the nineteenth-century: All works of the programme are related to dramatic choices and life determining decisions. All three depict the intensity of feelings of their romantic heroes, of their joy and grief about unfulfilled longing. “Daniele Gatti’s unconventionality is exiting” (NRC). “He took nothing for granted” (Trouw). “Triumphal!” (De Volkskrant) PROGRAM: Wagner, Overture to Tannhäuser; Liszt, Orpheus, Symphonic Poem No. 4; Berlioz, Symphonie fantastique
RCO: Gatti conducts Haydn & Mahler
Joseph Haydn’s Cello Concerto in C major was long thought to have been lost, but in 1961 the manuscript was discovered in the archives of the Prague National Museum. Chief conductor Daniele Gatti leads the principal cellist of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Tatjana Vassilijeva, in Haydn’s animated, ingenious work, before performing Gustav Mahler’s Fourth Symphony together with his orchestra. Mahler himself led the RCO in the Dutch premiere of the work in 1904. In the 3rd movement “Ruhevoll”, the orchestra’s sound is “so beautiful it makes you want to cry” (NRC). With her angelic voice, soprano Julia Kleiter sings an ode to Das himmlische Leben in the finale. The soprano solo, originally intended for the song cycle Des Knaben Wunderhorn, alternates with fast orchestral runs. PROGRAM Haydn: Cello Concerto in C major; Mahler: Symphony No. 4
RCO: Gatti conducts a French Night
Daniele Gatti is conducting three works all connected by the theme of nature and embodying the great musical changes taking place around 1900: Claude Debussy’s Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune and La mer and Igor Stravinsky’s Le sacre du printemps. In 1914, Debussy himself led the Concertgebouw Orchestra in his Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune and was met at the stage door by an applauding crowd after the performance. Stravinsky made his first guest appearance with the orchestra in 1924, after which he returned regularly. He conducted his Sacre twice in a single day in 1926 to long and loud ovations – a striking contrast to the premiere which caused a scandal. Under the baton of Maestro Gatti, the orchestra is performing these three groundbreaking classics on the same programme for the very first time. “What a mesmerizing playing level! The RCO was again incredibly good, with a level of detail and refinement that no other conductor achieves.” (Het Paarol)
RCO Opening Night 2016 – Daniele Gatti’s Inaugural Concert
The inaugural concert of Daniele Gatti as the new music director of Amsterdam’s fabled Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra – only the seventh in its 128-year history. Together with baritone Christian Gerhaher, Gatti presented a bouquet of works including Mozart arias and the Wayfarer Songs by Gustav Mahler, with whom the “world’s best orchestra” (Gramophone international music critics’ poll) has a unique tradition going back to the composer himself – who called Amsterdam his “second musical home”. The programme also includes Respighi’s Fountains of Rome as well as overtures by Verdi and Beethoven – with 30 members of the Netherlands Youth Orchestra joining the RCO musicians for the Overture to Egmont.