At the beautiful Théâtre des Bouffes Parisiens, Rolando Villazón partners with star French harpist Xavier de Maistre for a concert of intimate arrangements of Latin American songs for tenor and harp. Latin American song-writing, where indigenous, European and African cultures meet, offers a tantalising collage of sounds, rhythm, melody and narrative.
A month ahead of his highly anticipated Salzburg debut with “Les nuits d’été”, Benjamin Bernheim performs Berlioz’s cycle on DG Stage alongside songs by Duparc, Gounod and Hahn, accompanied on the piano by Carrie-Ann Matheson. Hailed by critics as “the major French lyric tenor the opera world is longing for”, Bernheim shows how at home he is in his native repertoire.
It started as just another warm night, back in June 2017 at the Waldbühne, Berlin. But when Ludovico Einaudi started to play, it became a Midsummer Night’s dream for everyone there. That unforgettable concert, in which he performed music from his album “Elements” as well as further repertoire, is available here as a world premiere for a global audience.
The high-point of the 2017 Bayreuth Festival: Barrie Kosky’s “astonishingly entertaining and convincing” (Der Spiegel) new Meistersinger is “a triumph” (Berliner Morgenpost): “a production of enormous insight and great quality … that plumbs the depths of both the opera and its composer” (Opera News). The “exquisite” cast (Die Zeit) is headed by Michael Volle’s “eloquent” Hans Sachs (New York Times). Philippe Jordan’s supple conducting is moulded around Kosky’s staging … and the Bayreuth orchestra and chorus are superb” (The Guardian).
Tobias Kratzer’s “novel…wrenching” (New York Times) 2019 production of Tannhäuser as a wildly contemporaryparable of art and freedom – with Valery Gergiev making his long-awaited Bayreuth Festival debut – was greeted with a standing ovation and exceptional press acclaim. The young Norwegian soprano Lise Davidsen makes her “astonishingly mature” (New York Times) Bayreuth debut as Elisabeth, American heldentenor Stephen Gould exhibits “great dramatic and vocal power in the title role” (Telegraph), and Russian mezzo Elena Zhidkova is the “scene stealing Venus”(Opera Today).
Following her success as Elsa (“Lohengrin”), Aida, Lady Macbeth and Turandot, Anna Netrebko has continued her move into the dramatic operatic repertoire, making her debut as Tosca in 2018. Watch her here in a new open-air performance of Puccini’s compelling opera staged at the Piazza del Plebiscito in Naples for the Teatro San Carlo. Netrebko is joined by Yusif Eyvazov as Cavaradossi and Ludovic Tézier as Scarpia.
Beethoven compose sa Deuxième Symphonie alors qu’il lui faut se résigner : sa surdité est incurable. Mais ce qu’on entend dans cette œuvre, c’est l’éclat, l’énergie d’un artiste qui sait qu’il a tout à donner et désormais rien à perdre. Raffinée, la Quatrième Symphonie ne manque pas d’impressionner par son exceptionnelle démonstration d’inspiration et de maîtrise.
Beethoven composed Symphony No. 2 while coming to terms with his incurable deafness. But what comes through is its brilliance and energy, from an artist who knew that he had everything to give and nothing else to lose. His refined Symphony No. 4 cannot fail to impress with its exceptional inspiration and compositional mastery.
From the 2018 Bayreuth Festival, the acclaimed new production by American director Yuval Sharon. The New York Times praised “the outstanding Piotr Beczala” as Lohengrin, “Anja Harteros [making] her impressive Bayreuth debut” as Elsa, and Ortrud “played with dominant presence by the incomparable Waltraud Meier”. The distinguished artists Neo Rauch and Rosa Loy created “breathtaking visuals”, and the whole performance was guided with “enthralling musicality” by conductor Christian Thielemann.
Richard Wagner’s ultimate, immortal tale of love and longing staged by the composer’s great-granddaughter Katharina Wagner and conducted by Christian Thielemann with an elegance and precision that is probably unsurpassable today” (Der Spiegel). The sublime cast includes Evelyn Herlitzius as Isolde, Stephen Gould as Tristan and Georg Zeppenfeld as Marke.
Pa-pa-pa-pam : quatre notes qui symbolisent le style symphonique de Beethoven. La Cinquième Symphonie entraîne l’auditeur dans une équipée folle mais grisante. Dans la Sixième Symphonie, intitulée Pastorale, on suit Beethoven, marcheur notoire, à la découverte de ruisseaux, fêtes de villages, orages et chants de bergers.
Da-da-da-dum: these are the four notes that epitomize Beethoven’s symphonic style. Symphony No. 5 takes the listener on a symphonic roller-coaster ride. In Symphony No. 6, also known as the “Pastoral”, the listener joins Beethoven on one of his famous walks to discover streams, village festivals, storms and shepherds’ songs.
Frank Castorf’s staging of the Ring, premiered in 2013 and filmed in 2016, provoked controversy right from the beginning. For Castorf, the Rheingold of our days is oil; thus he places the first part of the tetralogy at a gas station on Route 66. Die Walküre is situated in Baku, Azerbaijan, which was seized by the Bolsheviks in 1920 for its oil, whereas Siegfried takes place in a socialist equivalent of Mount Rushmore and at Berlin’s Alexanderplatz. Götterdämmerung is set somewhere in the GDR, ending up at New York’s stock exchange. Whilst Castorf’s staging polarized, Marek Janowski’s musical reading was unanimously praised, as was the excellent cast including in this opera Iain Paterson (Wotan), Nadine Weissmann (Erda), Albert Dohmen (Alberich) and Roberto Saccà (Loge).
Frank Castorf’s staging of the Ring, premiered in 2013 and filmed in 2016, provoked controversy right from the beginning. For Castorf, the Rheingold of our days is oil; thus he places the first part of the tetralogy at a gas station on Route 66. Die Walküre is situated in Baku, Azerbaijan, which was seized by the Bolsheviks in 1920 for its oil, whereas Siegfried takes place in a socialist equivalent of Mount Rushmore and at Berlin’s Alexanderplatz. Götterdämmerung is set somewhere in the GDR, ending up at New York’s stock exchange. Whilst Castorf’s staging polarized, Marek Janowski’s musical reading was unanimously praised, as was the excellent cast including in this opera Christopher Ventris (Siegmund), Georg Zeppenfeld (Hunding), John Lundgren (Wotan), Heidi Melton (Sieglinde) and Catherine Foster (Brünnhilde).
Frank Castorf’s staging of the Ring, premiered in 2013 and filmed in 2016, provoked controversy right from the beginning. For Castorf, the Rheingold of our days is oil; thus he places the first part of the tetralogy at a gas station on Route 66. Die Walküre is situated in Baku, Azerbaijan, which was seized by the Bolsheviks in 1920 for its oil, whereas Siegfried takes place in a socialist equivalent of Mount Rushmore and at Berlin’s Alexanderplatz. Götterdämmerung is set somewhere in the GDR, ending up at New York’s stock exchange. Whilst Castorf’s staging polarized, Marek Janowski’s musical reading was unanimously praised, as was the excellent cast including in this opera Stefan Vinke (Siegfried), Andreas Conrad (Mime), John Lundgren (Der Wanderer), Catherine Foster (Brünnhilde), Karl-Heinz Lehner (Fafner) and Nadine Weissmann (Erda).
Frank Castorf’s staging of the Ring, premiered in 2013 and filmed in 2016, provoked controversy right from the beginning. For Castorf, the Rheingold of our days is oil; thus he places the first part of the tetralogy at a gas station on Route 66. Die Walküre is situated in Baku, Azerbaijan, which was seized by the Bolsheviks in 1920 for its oil, whereas Siegfried takes place in a socialist equivalent of Mount Rushmore and at Berlin’s Alexanderplatz. Götterdämmerung is set somewhere in the GDR, ending up at New York’s stock exchange. Whilst Castorf’s staging polarized, Marek Janowski’s musical reading was unanimously praised, as was the excellent cast including in this opera Stefan Vinke (Siegfried), Markus Eiche (Gunther), Albert Pesendorfer (Hagen) and Catherine Foster (Brünnhilde).
Imposante et majestueuse, la Septième Symphonie est traversée de coups de tonnerre, de couleurs sombres, de mélodies populaires et de rais de lumière. Si l’on est parfois tenté de qualifier la Huitième Symphonie de légère, ses frottements harmoniques, son absence de mouvement lent et son vaste dernier mouvement en font plutôt une œuvre expérimentale.
Imposing and majestic, Symphony No. 7 has thunderbolts, dark passages, folk melodies and rays of light. While it can be tempting to describe Symphony No. 8 as lightweight, its harmonic friction, lack of a slow movement and hefty last movement make it more of an experimental work.
From the 2018 Bayreuth Festival, the acclaimed new production by American director Yuval Sharon. The New York Times praised “the outstanding Piotr Beczala” as Lohengrin, “Anja Harteros [making] her impressive Bayreuth debut” as Elsa, and Ortrud “played with dominant presence by the incomparable Waltraud Meier”. The distinguished artists Neo Rauch and Rosa Loy created “breathtaking visuals”, and the whole performance was guided with “enthralling musicality” by conductor Christian Thielemann.
The high-point of the 2017 Bayreuth Festival: Barrie Kosky’s “astonishingly entertaining and convincing” (Der Spiegel) new Meistersinger is “a triumph” (Berliner Morgenpost): “a production of enormous insight and great quality … that plumbs the depths of both the opera and its composer” (Opera News). The “exquisite” cast (Die Zeit) is headed by Michael Volle’s “eloquent” Hans Sachs (New York Times). Philippe Jordan’s supple conducting is moulded around Kosky’s staging … and the Bayreuth orchestra and chorus are superb” (The Guardian).
Tobias Kratzer’s “novel…wrenching” (New York Times) 2019 production of Tannhäuser as a wildly contemporaryparable of art and freedom – with Valery Gergiev making his long-awaited Bayreuth Festival debut – was greeted with a standing ovation and exceptional press acclaim. The young Norwegian soprano Lise Davidsen makes her “astonishingly mature” (New York Times) Bayreuth debut as Elisabeth, American heldentenor Stephen Gould exhibits “great dramatic and vocal power in the title role” (Telegraph), and Russian mezzo Elena Zhidkova is the “scene stealing Venus”(Opera Today).
La Première Symphonie de Beethoven s’inscrit dans la tradition classique mais présente des contrastes et une certaine insolence qui laissent présager la suite. Deux accords fiers et volontaires brisent le silence et donnent le ton de la grandiose Troisième Symphonie, « héroïque », à la fois cathartique et révolutionnaire.
Beethoven’s Symphony No. 1 is firmly rooted in the classical tradition, but features contrasts and a hint of audacity that forecast what’s to come. Two brave, proud chords break the silence and set the tone for Beethoven’s great Symphony No. 3 “Eroica”, which is at once cathartic and revolutionary.
In 1976 French director Patrice Chéreau’s centenary staging of Wagner’s Ring-Cycle unleashed the greatest scandal in Bayreuth Festival history but, by the end of its last performance in 1980, this epoch-making production was acclaimed with an hour and a half of thunderous applause.
In Das Rheingold, Wotan wears the brocade coat of feudal times while the Rhine seems to be a reservoir with a modern power station, whereas Die Walküre gets a radical re-imaging unprecedented in its psychological penetration. Siegfried was described by Chéreau as “a hero (that) has been created who would actually have had all the attributes of freedom, but nobody remembered to tell him…”. And the closing Götterdämmerung for the director “presents a world in which no values exist any more. The only refuge is in the past”.
Pierre Boulez’ conducting and the excellent cast with Donald McIntyre (Wotan), Heinz Zednik (Loge), Hermann Becht (Alberich), Hanna Schwarz (Fricke)
Siegfried Jerusalem (Froh), Matti Salminen (Fasolt), Ortrun Wenkel (Erda) and many others also contributed to the legendary status of this production with their musical and dramatic interpretations and performances.
In 1976 French director Patrice Chéreau’s centenary staging of Wagner’s Ring-Cycle unleashed the greatest scandal in Bayreuth Festival history but, by the end of its last performance in 1980, this epoch-making production was acclaimed with an hour and a half of thunderous applause.
In Das Rheingold, Wotan wears the brocade coat of feudal times while the Rhine seems to be a reservoir with a modern power station, whereas Die Walküre gets a radical re-imaging unprecedented in its psychological penetration. Siegfried was described by Chéreau as “a hero (that) has been created who would actually have had all the attributes of freedom, but nobody remembered to tell him…”. And the closing Götterdämmerung for the director “presents a world in which no values exist any more. The only refuge is in the past”.
Pierre Boulez’ conducting and the excellent cast with Gwyneth Jones (Brünnhilde), Jeannine Altmeyer (Sieglinde), Hanna Schwarz (Fricke), Peter Hofmann (Siegmund), Matti Salminen (Hunding), Donald McIntyre (Wotan), Gabriele Schnaut (Waltraute) and many others also contributed to the legendary status of this production with their musical and dramatic interpretations and performances.
In 1976 French director Patrice Chéreau’s centenary staging of Wagner’s Ring-Cycle unleashed the greatest scandal in Bayreuth Festival history but, by the end of its last performance in 1980, this epoch-making production was acclaimed with an hour and a half of thunderous applause.
In Das Rheingold, Wotan wears the brocade coat of feudal times while the Rhine seems to be a reservoir with a modern power station, whereas Die Walküre gets a radical re-imaging unprecedented in its psychological penetration. Siegfried was described by Chéreau as “a hero (that) has been created who would actually have had all the attributes of freedom, but nobody remembered to tell him…”. And the closing Götterdämmerung for the director “presents a world in which no values exist any more. The only refuge is in the past”.
Pierre Boulez’ conducting and the excellent cast with Manfred Jung (Siegfried), Donald McIntyre (Der Wanderer), Gwyneth Jones (Brünnhilde), Heinz Zednik (Mime), Hermann Becht (Alberich), Fritz Hübner (Hafner), Ortrun Wenkel (Erda) and many others also contributed to the legendary status of this production with their musical and dramatic interpretations and performances.
Every new production of Parsifal in Bayreuth is a special event, as it was written specifically with the Bayreuth acoustic in mind. In summer 2016, director Uwe Eric Laufenberg presented his reading of Wagner’s Bühnenweihfestspiel, transposing it to a region bordering Iraq, Turkey, Armenia and Azerbaijan – in other words, to the very heart of today’s religious wars. The cast boasted Klaus Florian Vogt as a silvery yet clarion-toned Parsifal, the fabulous Elena Pankratova as Kundry, the “Rose from Hell”, rich-voiced Georg Zeppenfeld as Gurnemanz, Ryan McKinny with his burnished baritone as Amfortas and Gerd Grochowski in one of his last major roles as Klingsor. The New York Times was full of praise: “Sensitive, visually arresting … With an excellent cast and the conductor Hartmut Haenchen drawing radiant sound and striking transparency from the festival orchestra, this was a sublime and provocative Parsifal.”
In 1976 French director Patrice Chéreau’s centenary staging of Wagner’s Ring-Cycle unleashed the greatest scandal in Bayreuth Festival history but, by the end of its last performance in 1980, this epoch-making production was acclaimed with an hour and a half of thunderous applause.
In Das Rheingold, Wotan wears the brocade coat of feudal times while the Rhine seems to be a reservoir with a modern power station, whereas Die Walküre gets a radical re-imaging unprecedented in its psychological penetration. Siegfried was described by Chéreau as “a hero (that) has been created who would actually have had all the attributes of freedom, but nobody remembered to tell him…”. And the closing Götterdämmerung for the director “presents a world in which no values exist any more. The only refuge is in the past”.
Pierre Boulez’ conducting and the excellent cast with Gwyneth Jones (Brünnhilde), Manfred Jung (Siegfried), Fritz Hübner (Hagen), Jeannine Altmeyer (Gutrune), Hermann Becht (Alberich), Franz Mazura (Gunther), Gwendolyn Killebrew (Waltraute) and many others also contributed to the legendary status of this production with their musical and dramatic interpretations and performances.