Charles-François Gounod’s Faust, with a libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré, premiered at the Théâtre Lyrique on the Boulevard du Temple in Paris on 19 March 1859. It underwent several revisions over the following decade, including the insertion of a ballet into Act V to meet the expectations of grand opera, and was extremely popular in the nineteenth century. It was the work with which New York’s Metropolitan Opera opened for the first time on...

Surprisingly, a major title of the French operatic tradition such as Gounod’s Faust had never been staged before at the Salzburg Festival. It happened this year in a production signed by Austrian director Reinhard von der Thannen, responsible for sets and costumes as well. However solid the cast was, the main focus of the production was certainly von der Thannen’s staging  – and with good reason (one could actually tell right from the programme notes, entrusted to...

Rien - "Nothing" thrones over the bright white stage. "We start from nothing and return to nothing" might be one theme of this contradictory direction of Reinhard von der Thannen. He is responsible for the direction, the costumes and the stage design of this first presentation of this opera in Salzburg. He has studied and worked with Hans Neuenfels, originally as stage and costume designer, and you can feel the influence and some memories of the controversial...