La Sonnambula Crowns Nadine Sierra as new Liceu Queen

The main attraction of this Lucia di Lammermoor presented at Liceu, with 14 performances lasting until after Christmas, was the world’s debut of Juan Diego Flórez as Edgardo, one of the greatest bel canto roles, which the celebrated Peruvian tenor had not yet tackled. Nowadays, this opera is considered a “soprano opera”, but it has not always been this way. Since its premiere in 1835, with the great Gilbert Duprez in the main male character, and until the...

Sergei Prokofiev was very fond of the story when he first red the novel of Valeri Brjussow and found some autobiographical parallels with his own life, relations and philosophical orientation. His inner conflict between rationalism and Christian belief, reality and surrealism, love and affection, demon and obsession. He started the composition during his exile years in Paris and Ettal, Germany. After the unsuccessful first presentation, he composed a second version, which he was not able...

Although Pietro Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana and Ruggero Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci are entirely separate operas, they are so frequently performed together that ‘Cav and Pag’ is now a standard phrase in the operatic world. Written only two years apart, in 1890 and 1892 respectively, their short running times mean they can comfortably fit into one evening, while both tell stories of love, betrayal, jealousy and murder. Many directors ensure that the same...

Benedikt von Peter, currently head of at the Theater Bremen and designated head of Lucerne theater from 2016 onwards, has gained reputation for sophisticated deeply analytical directions of operas, opening new views on characters, their relations and plots. Focussing on libretto and strongly on the musical composition, he gains new aspects which he consequently transfers into his realisation. Some key elements of his view on Aida have been published before the opening evening. He...

Three artists who integrated the “excess” in their art or in their lives, together with the renaissance goldsmith and sculptor Benvenuto Cellini, providing the character and the subject, the composer Hector Berlioz bringing the music, and Terry Gilliam, film and stage director, on the staging are the parents of the spectacular and captivating production that is taking place at Liceu and which most probably will be the big event of the season. The vigorous start with a...

The first premiere of the new season of the Bavarian State Opera is a historical premiere too. First time Arrigo Boito's opera Mefistofele on stage here. Arrigo Boito is one of the glamorous artists of Italy in the last 19th century. Educated in music, he was a literary, a librettist and a composer, but also a political and philosophical active person too. As a founding member of the avant-garde artist group "I Scapigliatura", the tousled - he represented the newly found...