Monteverdi Cycle from Berlin: Orpheus

Monteverdi's La Favola d'Orfeo is acknowledged as the very first opera, his three surviving complete operas are accordingly right at the start of operatic history, and yet Berlin's Komische Oper has succeeded in making these three works "so modern and thrilling" that, as Bayerischer Rundfunk said, "the 400 intervening years sometimes seemed to have been eliminated". In a stage production by Barrie Kosky and a new instrumentation by the Tashkent-born, internationally successful composer Elena Kats-Chernin, conductor André de Ridder presents a brilliantly selected ensemble, comprising 32 soloists and a supporting cast of over 200. The electrifying curtain-raiser is Orpheus, compelling as a rich feast of the senses in a lush blooming stage Arcadia, peopled by a fantastic company of nymphs and satyrs. Amid joyful song and captivating dance interludes, the mythical singer's passionate young love for Eurydice blossoms till its tragic end at her death.