The Cunning Little Vixen

“How the Lithuanian conductor Giedrė Šlekytė 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 Janáček 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 Janáček’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.