According to stage director Sven-Eric Bechtolf “Don Giovanni is a romantic hero of metaphysical proportions.” He sees Don Giovanni as a person who is craving for freedom and a lack of boundaries in a puritan society. The role is performed by Italian bass-baritone Ildebrando D’Arcangelo, one of today’s leading Mozart singers (like Luca Pisaroni who sings Leporello, and Lenneke Ruiten who performs Donna Anna). Leading the Wiener Philharmoniker is the German conductor Christoph Eschenbach, a heir of George Szell and Herbert von Karajan.
Geschichten aus dem Wiener Wald (Tales From The Vienna Wood)
Ödön von Horváth’s 1931 play “Tales from the Vienna Woods” takes a twisted view of Johann Strauss Jr’s 1868 waltz of the same title. During his lifetime, he considered
teaming up with Kurt Weil to make an opera of the work. Three-quarters of a century later, the Bregenz Festival has finally accomplished this job, by asking Viennese
composer Heinz Karl Gruber to write the opera – and “Gruber is a worthy substitute for Weil” states the Financial Times.
Richard Strauss – At The End of the Rainbow
Richard Strauss – who regarded himself as the last great composer ‘at the end of the rainbow’ – for sure is one of the most interesting artists of his time. This documentary by Eric Schulz (also known for the film “Karajan – The Second Life”) on the occasion of the composer’s 150th birthday gives insight into the personality and the works of Richard Strauss with never-released archive material and high-class interview partners such as Brigitte Fassbaender, Klaus König, Raymond Holden, Christian Strauss, Walter Werbeck, Emma Moore.
Salzburg Festival 2013: Mozart, Così fan tutte
Sven-Eric Bechtolf, dramatic director of the Salzburg Festival, staged this new production of Mozart’s Così fan tutte, conducted by German conductor Christoph Eschenbach, music director of the National Symphony Orchestra and the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.. Featuring Malin Hartelius as Fiordiligi, “who cuts an attractive figure, acting with charm and ease.” Luca Pisaroni’s Guglielmo is “generous in dimension and in possession of all the necessary criteria for the role”. (Moore Parker, The Opera Critic)
Salzburg Festival 2013: von Hofmannsthal, Jedermann
“Jederman” is the most popular spectacle of the Salzburg Festival since 1920, sold out every year. In 2013 ,the spectacle, with renowed German actor Peter Lohmeyer as “Jedermann”, was presented in a live transmission in 50 cinemas in Germany.
Salzburg Festival 2013: A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Shakespeare / Mendelssohn)
The new production of Shakespeares’ A Midsummer Night’s Dream with the incidental music by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy from Salzburg Festival 2013 is performed in a new translation and edition by Austrian director Henry Mason. Ivor Bolton, chief conductor of the Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg, leads the open-air perfomance at Salzburg’s stunning Courtyard of the Residenz Palace.
Bregenz Festival 2013: André Tchaikowsky, The Merchant of Venice
William Shakespear’s play was turned into an opera by André Tchaikowsky, a Polish-born composer who emigrated to Great Britain. He wrote the opera in 1970s and 80s, but it has never been performed. The world premiere at Bregenz Festival received rave reviews for the staging and the artistic perfomance of the cast: “Keith Warner’s elegant, flowing production evokes the time of the Dreyfus Affair” … “Though Adrian Eröd’s poignantly powerful Shylock stood out, the rest of the excellent cast helped make this a restitution to remember.” (The Telegraph)
Puccini, La fanciulla del West
A celebrated new production of Puccini’s La fanciulla del West from the Vienna State opera featuring Jonas Kaufmann and Nina Stemme. Stage by Marco Arturo Marelli, who sets it in a modern-day mining village. ‘Nina Stemme and Jonas Kaufmann are the opera’s must-see couple for a generation’ (Financal Times). ‘Excellent singing from top to bottom, tight orchestral playing, beautiful lighting, and a decisive lack of cowboys, saloons and other “Wild West” clichés.’ (Bachtrack.com)
Salzburg Festival: Verdi, Il Trovatore
“Anna Netrebko – better than Maria Callas” (Süddeutsche Zeitung) – Since her sensational success in “La Traviata” the soprano Anna Netrebko, now even more popular than ever before, returns regularly to the great festival hall at the Salzburg Festival. This time she shines as Leonora in Giuseppe Verdi’s tragic opera “Il Trovatore” at the side of Placido Domingo and the critics go wild: “A triumph” writes the New York Times, while the Neue Zürcher Zeitung speaks of “truly divine sounds”. Alvis Hermanis staged the plot that revolves round two rival brothers who love the same woman and only learn they are related at the moment of her death, using sets that “in their opulent adherence to detail and fantastically illuminated atmosphere (…) offer much more than just a decorative sight for sore eyes“ (Salzburger Nachrichten).
Tchaikovsky, Swan Lake (Schwanensee)
To mark the 50th anniversary of Rudolf Nureyev’s legendary production of Tschaikovsky’s ballet in 1964, the Vienna State Opera is now reviving it with new sets and costumes designed by Julia Spinatelli, whose concept is inspired by the fairytale phantasy world of King Ludwig II incorporating simple, painted backdrops and few accessories, to present a new Swan Lake.