In this intimate staging of Bellini’s masterpiece opera, Asmik Grigorian’s highly anticipated debut as Norma is “one of the best things to happen to Vienna’s opera stages in a long time” (FAZ). Set in a dictatorship of the 20th century, Grigorian’s Norma is the forewoman of a clay foundry. Vasily Barkhatov’s “convincingly concentrated, intimate staging” (Kronenzeitung) underscores the drama of the love triangle between the three central characters. Grigorian masters the notoriously difficult role with bravura: “Grigorian is a true Callas successor because every gesture and facial expression merges with her musical expression” (Kleine Zeitung). In Aigul Akhmetshina as Adalgisa, “she found a counterpart who has one of the richest mezzo voices of our time” (Die Presse). Freddie De Tommaso as Pollione completes the three-way conflict with his “clean and beautifully sounding” tenor (Oper News). Rounding out the evening musically are the “magnificent in every respect” Arnold Schoenberg Chor (Salzburger Nachrichten). “All in all, a breathtakingly thrilling evening with a perfect interlocking of stage and pit” (Van Magazin).
The Cunning Little Vixen
“How the Lithuanian conductor Giedre Šlekyte conjures up beautiful timbres, what she gets out of the orchestra, is remarkable. This is a conductor one wants to hear more often.” (Kurier) The Cunning Little Vixen, first performed in 1924 and based on a novella by Rudolf Tešnohlídek, is an unconventional portrayal of humans and animals in which the composer Leoš Janácek breaks new ground. His music, as playful as it is melancholic, celebrates the circle of life. For Stefan Herheim, this is a good reason to use Janácek’s opera to celebrate the transformational power of musical theatre when he makes his entrance bow at the Musiktheater an der Wien as the new hands-on artistic director.
Die Fledermaus
On 5 April 1874, at what is now Linke Wienzeile, a world premiere took place that changed the genre of operetta and the history of the Theater an der Wien for good. To mark Johann Strauss’ 200th birthday, artistic director Stefan Herheim surprises with a fresh new production of the “queen of operettas”: Musical references that tie back to the Theater an der Wien, political warnings and precise character work make for a truly unique spin on an old classic. “Alina Wunderlin is a delightful grumpy Adele with coloratura qualities, Hulkar Sabirova throws herself wholeheartedly into the role of Rosalinde and Thomas Blondelle is a pompous, sleazy Eisenstein, just as one could wish for” (APA). Chief conductor Petr Popelka “achieves success with the confident and supple orchestra and the enthusiastic and splendid Schoenberg Choir” (Die Presse). “A brilliant performance by conductor and orchestra!” (FAZ)
Kublai Khan
In April 2024, the Komische Oper Cublai, gran kan de’ Tartari by Giambattista Casti celebrate its world premiere with music by Antonio Salieri from 1786 at the MusikTheater an der Wien. Kublai Khan, grandson of the dreaded Genghis Khan, at least still has quite a bit of trouble on his hands. Things are not going well in the great empire: backward economy, cultureless people of barbaric customs. At least that’s the European view of the two Italian emigrants, who are supposed to lead the court into the civilized age of the Enlightenment. To make matters worse, the succession to the throne is also shaky. The son of the Khan is anything but fit to rule and the Indian princess refuses to marry. Director Martin G. Berger places the question of tradition and transformation at the centre of his production. In today’s Vienna, Berger and his production team Antonio Salieri now go in search of traces of how social coexistence between the tried and tested and reimagined is possible in the 21st century and finally help the composer to give his world premiere after all. Conductor Christophe Rousset, who has been committed to Antonio Salieri’s music for many years and will now rehearse the original Italian version, will provide the musical enjoyment.
Where the Wild Things Are
Based on Maurice Sendak’s Where The Wild Things Are, one of the world’s best selling and most beloved children’s books, this opera will enchant children and adults alike. To turn his story about a young boy who travels to a faraway island full of wild creatures into an opera libretto, author Maurice Sendak let his imagination run riot. He invented, for instance, a new language for the wild creatures that Max meets on the island. This inspired British composer Oliver Knussen to what is probably his most adventurous music: It whistles, squeaks, sparkles, shines, entices and dances with delightful lightness. This production at the MusikTheater an der Wien “captivates as a kind of Gesamtkunstwerk” (Kurier). With loving attention to even the smallest detail, director and puppet virtuoso Nikolaus Habjan and his team created fabulous life-size puppets for Max and his “wild things”. The singers are in the bodies of the puppets and puppeteers handle the gestures and facial expressions. “The result is a visually stunning round dance of monsters” (Kleine Zeitung).
Les Martyrs
Love, faith, death and the question of what people are prepared to risk for their values and convictions. Gaetano Donizetti deals with these themes using the example of Christian martyrdom. An outrage for the Italian censors of the 1830s, prompting Gaetano Donizetti to switch to France and enlist the help of librettist Eugène Scribe to publish the opera he had been planning, Poliuto, as a grand opéra. Under the title Les martyrs the work had its premiere in Paris in 1840 and included, among other things, a ballet scene, an innovative score structure that presaged the music-drama form, and a spectacularly reworked tenor part. Today, it is one of Donizetti’s lesser-known and rarely performed works, but for Polish director Cezary Tomaszewski it is nevertheless “the best Donizetti opera. A hybrid of bel canto and grand opéra. A masterpiece, thrilling, cinematic with multi-layered and exciting characters”. He transfers the plot to a fantastic, amorphous and futuristic world that focuses on the attempted domination of power over the body. American tenor
John Osborn is debuting in the demanding bel canto part of Polyceute (“heroic, confident in the heights, and supple the Polyeucte of John Osborn”, Der Standard). He is joined by Roberta Mantegna as Pauline (“her singing is enchanting – firm, yet soft and radiant tones with sparkling coloratura”, klasikaplus.cz) The ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra is conducted by Jérémie Rhorer, a specialist in historically informed performance practice. “An absolute event is the […] consummately singing Arnold Schoenberg Choir.” (Kurier)v
La gazza ladra
A feathered thief, a servant wrongly sentenced to death and a corrupt, power-hungry politician: those are the protagonists of Rossini’s semi-serious opera whose overture, with its drum rolls and oboe solo, is one of the best-known pieces in the history of music. La gazza ladra (The Thieving Magpie) is set in a time of great social upheaval. When Ninetta is accused of stealing a silver spoon, a series of unfortunate events begins that initially makes the happy ending expected from an opera semiseria seem highly unlikely. What sort of world is it where a person can be executed for the alleged theft of a spoon? Tobias Kratzer, successful as a director throughout Europe, now debuts in Vienna with Rossini’s opera that received its first performance in 1817 and traces the uncertainty felt by people in a politically and socially destabilised world. “To the left and right, drum rolls sound from the pit, then the ORF Radio Symphony Orchestra gets going, effervescent, grand, dense and dark, but at the same time filigree. [The Arnold Schoenberg Choir, Marina de Liso, Maxim Mironov, Fabio Capitanucci and all the others] “sing and play as if they had inhaled Kratzer’s idea of the highly lively, truthful play.” (Süddeutsche Zeitung)