New season 2015-2016 at the Opéra National de Paris

This Saturday morning, I have received the program of the 2015-2016 season at the Opéra National de Paris. It is the first season entirely conceived by new general manager Stéphane Lissner, back from the Teatro alla Scala in Milan.

20 operas by 16 composers will be performed in 5 languages (there are 16 operas by 12 composers in 4 languages during the 2014-2015 season).

The season includes 8 new productions :

- Arnold Schönberg : Moses und Aron, conducted by Philippe Jordan, directed by Romeo Castellucci, with Thomas Johannes Mayer and John Graham-Hall ;
- a double bill with Bela Bartok's Duke Bluebeard's Castle and Francis Poulenc's La Voix humaine, conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen, directed by Krzysztof Warlikowski, with Johannes Martin Kränzle, Ekaterina Gubanova and Barbara Hannigan ;
- Hector Berlioz : La Damnation de Faust, conducted by Philippe Jordan, directed by Alvis Hermanis, with Sophie Koch, Jonas Kaufman and Bryn Terfel ;
- Giuseppe Verdi : Il Trovatore, conducted by Daniele Callegari, directed by Alex Ollé, with Ludovic Tézier, Anna Netrebko, Ekaterina Sementchuk and Marcelo Alvarez ;
- Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky : Iolanta, conducted by Alain Altinoglu, directed by Dmitri Tcherniakov, with Sonya Yoncheva and Alexander Tsymbalyuk (double bill with the ballet Nutcracker) ;
- Giuseppe Verdi : Rigoletto, conducted by Nicola Luisotti, directed by Claus Guth, with Quinn Kelsey and Olga Peretyatko ;
- Aribert Reimann : Lear, conducted by Fabio Luisi, directed by Calixto Bieito, with Bo Skovhus, Gidon Saks, Ricarda Merbeth and Edda Moser.

Also advertised as a new production but already performed in Salzburg in 2013, Richard Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, conducted by Philippe Jordan, directed by Stefan Herheim, with Gerald Finley, Bo Skovhus and Julia Kleiter.

Another contemporary opera will have its first performance in France (and in French) : Joanna Lee's The Way back Home (as Vol retour), conducted by Stephen Higgins and directed by Katie Mitchell.

The following productions will be revived :

- Giacomo Puccini : Madama Butterfly, directed by Robert Wilson ;
- Jean-Philippe Rameau : Platée, directed by Laurent Pelly ;
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart : Don Giovanni, directed by Michael Haneke ;
- Gaetano Donizetti : L'Elisir d'amore, directed by Laurent Pelly ;
- Jules Massenet : Werther, directed by Benoit Jacquot ;
- Richard Strauss : Capriccio, directed by Robert Carsen ;
- Gioachino Rossini : Il Barbiere di Siviglia, directed by Damiano Michieletto ;
- Richard Strauss : Der Rosenkavalier, directed by Herbert Wernicke ;
- Giuseppe Verdi : La Traviata, directed by Benoit Jacquot ;
- Giuseppe Verdi : Aida, directed by Olivier Py.

Here are some interesting statistics :

- 2 operas composed in the 18th century, 11 from the 19th century, 6 from the 20th century and 1 from the 21st century ;
- 8 operas in Italian, 5 in French, 5 in German, 1 in Hungarian and 1 in Russian.

Reimann's opera is a welcome new production considering we will celebrate the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's death in 2016. This season is the most interesting we had ath the Opéra national de Paris for years. Let's hope that it will be followed by other new productions including world premières.

New items in my collection

This Wednesday, I can add the following items to my collection :

- John Adams : The Flowering Tree, program book, Paris, 2014 ;
- John Adams : Doctor Atomic, program book, Strasbourg, 2014 ;
- Julian Anderson : Thebans, program book, London (ENO), 2014 ;

- Theater Ulm : June 2014 leaflet.

Received in the mail this Tuesday morning

This Tuesday morning, I have received the following in the mail :

- Berlin, Deutsche Oper : June 2014 brochure ;
- Berlin, Konzerthaus : 2014-2015 season program book ;
- Giessen, Stadttheater : 2014-2015 season program book ;
- Heidelberg, Theater und Orchester : Schlossfestspiele 2014 brochure ;
- Strasbourg, Opéra national du Rhin : 2014-2015 season program book ;
- Stuttgart, Staatstheater : June 2014 leaflet ;
- Trier, Theater : June 2014 leaflet.

New season 2014-2015 at the Opéra National de Paris

Here are the operas to be performed in Palais Garnier and Opéra Bastille during the 2014-2015 season : 

- Giuseppe Verdi : La Traviata

- Gioachino Rossini : Il Barbiere di Siviglia

- Giacomo Puccini : Tosca

- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart : Die Entführung aus dem Serail

- Engelbert Humperdinck : Hänsel und Gretel

- Giacomo Puccini : La Bohème

- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart : Don Giovanni

- Richard Strauss : Ariadne auf Naxos

- Claude Debussy : Pelléas et Mélisande

- Charles Gounod : Faust

- Jules Massenet : Le Cid

- Antonin Dvorak : Rusalka

- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart : Die Zauberflöte

- Ernest Chausson : Le roi Arthus

- Christoph Willibald Gluck : Alceste

- Francesco Cilea : Adriana Lecouvreur 

16 operas by 12 composers in four languages. 

14 of these operas are among the most performed in the world.

In the foreword to the season program book, the general manager Nicolas Joel writes about six new productions : “Six nouvelles productions lyriques”. But, if you decide to check for yourself, you’ll find out there are only 3 (Tosca, Die Entführung aus dem Serail and Le roi Arthus). What a shame !

- Rossini’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia : directed by Damiano Michieletto, it has already been staged in Geneva in 2010, Reggio Emilia, Saint-Etienne and Firenze ; 

- Massenet’s Le Cid: directed by Charles Roubaud, it has been staged in Marseille in June 2011 ;

- Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur : directed by David McVicar, it has been staged in London in November 2010, and then in Barcelona and Vienna. 

The only two productions that could be of interest are Le Cid and Le roi Arthus. But Nicolas Joel is really not lucky, considering the Chausson opera has just been performed by the Opéra national du Rhin in Strasbourg and Mulhouse.

Therefore we have 3 real new productions, 3 false new productions, and 10 revivals.

Here are the world premiere performances that took place at Opéra national de Paris since 2007 : 

- Georg Friedrich Haas : Melancholia, June 2008 ; 

- Philippe Boesmans : Yvonne princesse de Bourgogne, January 2009 ; 

- Bruno Mantovani : Akhmatova, March 2011 ;

- Philippe Fénelon : La Cerisaie, January 2012 (it had been performed in concert in Moscow in December 2010). 

Since then, Opéra national de Paris has done nothing to promote living composers, ensuring their defection to foreign countries to have their operas performed (for example, Marc-André Dalbavie’s opera Charlotte Salomon will be performed next Summer in Salzburg).

We have no operas in Russian or English, no contemporary or even modern work (in fact no opera composed in the last 98 years, since Ariadne auf Naxos), no opera that has not been recorded.

At least, the casts will include some of the most famous singers of our time : Dmitri Hvorostovsky in La Traviata, Marcelo Alvarez and Ludovic Tézier in Tosca, Erwin Schrott in Don Giovanni, Franz Grundheber, Sophie Koch and Klaus Florian Vogt in Ariadne auf Naxos, Stéphane Degout in Pelléas et Mélisande, Piotr Beczala in Faust, Anna Caterina Antonacci, Annick Massis and Roberto Alagna in Le Cid, Sophie Koch, Thomas Hampson and Roberto Alagna in Le roi Arthus, Véronique Gens and Stéphane Degout in Alceste, Marcelo Alvarez and Angela Gheorghiu in Adriana Lecouvreur.

Unfortunately, these great casts can barely hide the poverty of this unchallenging season.