Ancient Greece hits the Champs-Elysées in Offenbach’s La belle Hélène. Mythological mayhem ensues – delightfully sexy, deliriously silly and swept dancing along by music that’s as fizzy (and as intoxicating) as champagne. No two artists have done more to put the sparkle back into French operetta than conductor Marc Minkowski and director Laurent Pelly, and in this now-classic production from the year 2000, Pelly’s zany visuals find a perfect complement in the freshness and flair of Minkowski’s period-instrument orchestra. The cast is to die for, too – with Laurent Naouri as Agamemnon and the great Felicity Lott having the time of her life in the title role.
Minkowski conducts Mozart and Schubert
The Salzburg Mozart Week – arranged by the Mozarteum foundation, the trustees of Mozart’s musical legacy – is always offering something unique: under the direction of the principal conductor and artistic director of the Salzburg Mozart Week, Mark Minkowski, the Musiciens du Louvre perform on not one but two of Mozart’s original instruments! Mozart’s Violin Concerto and his Piano Concerto in A major are played on instruments that were once in the composer’s possession. In Franz Schubert’s Great C major Symphony, the culmination of this wonderful evening, ”Minkowski and the Musiciens du Louvre are entirely in their element” (Wiener Zeitung).
Bartabas in Salzburg 2016 – Mozart: Davide Penitente
For this spectacular production of Mozart’s Davide penitente on the vast stage of the Salzburg Felsenreitschule at the Mozart Week 2015, Marc Minkowski and the equestrian choreographer Bartabas used dancing horses and thus restored the former riding school to its original function. Horses, riders from the Académie équestre de Versailles and Bartabas himself, whose successful productions are unique in the world of art, perform their elegant dressage arabesques within this exceptional setting. Soloists, chorus and orchestra are ranged over three levels on galleries cut from the bare rock. The result is a unique synthesis of the arts.