New program books in my collection : 'Notorious' by Hans Gefors (Göteborg) and 'Penthesilea' by Pascal Dusapin (Strasbourg)

This Wednesday morning, I have received two program books in the mail :

- Pascal Dusapin : Penthesilea, (first performed in Brussels), from Strasbourg (first performance on September 26th ;
- Hans Gefors : Notorious, first performance in Göteborg, September 19th, 2015.

I have already described the program book for the world première performance of Penthesilea in Brussels. The 100 pages French program book contains :

- complete cast and crew ;
- introduction on the opera in the carrier of Pascal Dusapin ;
- Beate Haeckl : synopsis, trilingual (French, German, English) ;
- an article by the composer, reproduced from the Belgian book ;
- an interview with the conductor Franck Ollu ;
- the orchestra setting ;
- interview with the director Pierre Audi ;
- Antonin Artaud : Le Théâtre et la Cruauté, from Le Théâtre et son double (1938) ;
- Marie Faucher : Pascal Dusapin : l'invention musicale à fleur de peau ;
- Ruth Orthman : J'ai dit un mot à la place de l'autre (Aux origines du livret) ;
- Meroe's monologue from the play by Heinrich von Kleist ;
- Marie Lenormand : Sanglante fête des roses ;
- excerpt from The Bacchae by Euripides ;
- Murat Alat : Les vertus d'une existence en vitrine ;
- an excerpt of Oscar Wilde's Salome ;
- complete libretto in German and French ;
- biographies of the artists, with B&W headshots ;
- several colour photos from the original production.

The 144 pages program book for Notorious is in Swedish. It contains :

- complete cast and crew ;
- introduction and synopsis (with English translations) ;
- Hans Gefors : The Genesis of the opera (with English translation) ;
- biographies of composer Hans Gefors and librettist Kerstin Perski ;
- Kerstin Perski : The Notorious libretto (with English translation) ;
- an article by the conductor Patrik Ringborg ;
- biographies of cast and crew with B&W headshots ;
- an article by Paul Duncan on the Hitchcock movie ;
- an interview with Hans Gefors ;
- complete and detailed chronology from the commission of the opera early 2009 to the world première in 2015 ;
- complete libretto in Swedish with English translation ;
- several colour photos from the original production.

Scanned covers of all the program books I have (almost 400) in my collection are available in this flickr folder.

Received in the mail this morning : program book for Dusapin's 'Penthesilea' in Brussels

This Tuesday morning, I have received the two volumes published for by the Théâtre de La Monnaie in Brussels for the world première performance of Pascal Dusapin's new opera Penthesilea.

The first volume (112 pages) contains :

- the complete cast ;
- the synopsis, written by librettist Beate Haeckl ;
- an article by the composer Pascal Dusapin ;
- an lettre written by Belgian artist Berlinde De Bruyckere to J. M. Coetzee ;
- an article by musicologist Harry Halbreich ;
- an article by Murat Alat ;
- an article by Hélène Cixous, Achille est Penthésilée est Achille.

There are also a number of quotes by Heinrich von Kleist, Pascal Dusapin, Gilles Deleuze, Maurice Blanchot, Michel Foucault and Georges Bataille, as well as several photos of sculptures by Berlinde De Bruyckere.

The whole book is bilingual, Dutch and French. A 40 pages separate booklet contains the complete and detailed cast and biographies.

The second volume (44 pages) contains the complete libretto in the original German, with Dutch and French translations.

Scans of the front covers of all program books for contemporary opera I have are available in a flickr folder.

Today : world première of 'Penthesilea' by Pascal Dusapin in Brussels

Today, Pascal Dusapin's new opera, Penthesilea, with a libretto (in French) by Beate Haeckl and the composer after Heinrich von Kleist, will be performed in Brussels (Théâtre de la Monnaie).

Penthesilea, the proud queen of the Amazons ! After the accidental death of her sister Hippolyta, she took part in the Trojan War to prove the courage of the Amazons. A complex and deadly game of love and hate, attraction and repulsion arose between Penthesilea and Achilles. It was Heinrich von Kleist (1808) who brought the subject into the modern era. In his version, Achilles does not kill Penthesilea, but vice versa : in a moment of tragic madness she tears apart the one she loves with her teeth. (reproduced from La Monnaie website)

The cast includes Natascha Petrinsky (Penthesilea), Marisol Montalvo (Prothoe), Georg Nigl (Achilles), Werner van Mechelen (Odysseus). La Monnaie Symphony Orchestra and Chorus are conducted by Franck Ollu. Pierre Audi directs.

It is Dusapin's seventh opera since Romeo and Juliet in 1988. His most recent stage works are Perelà - Uomo di fuomo (2001), Faustus, The Last Night (2004) and Passion (2008). Kleist's play has already been adapted to the stage : by René Koering (Scène de chasse, Montpellier, 2009) and Othmar Schoeck (1927).

The performance should last about 1 hour and 45 minutes (no intermission). The production will be available for streaming on the opera house website from April 23rd to May 13th. No broadcast seems to be planned. The opera will be also performed in Strasbourg (Musica festival) next September.

New Season 2014-2015 at La Monnaie (De Munt) in Brussels

During the 2014-2015 season, the following operas will be performed at La Monnaie (De Munt) in Brussels :

- Richard Strauss : Daphne, conducted by Lothar Koenigs, directed by Guy Joosten ;
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart : Don Giovanni, conducted by Ludovic Morlot, directed by Krzysztof Warlikowski ;
- Georg Friedrich Haendel : Tamerlano, conducted by Christophe Rousset, directed by Pierre Audi ;
- Georg Friedrich Haendel : Alcina, conducted by Christophe Rousset, directed by Pierre Audi ;
- Wolfgang Rihm : Jakob Lenz, conducted by Franck Ollu, directed by Andrea Breth ;
- Pascal Dusapin : Penthesilea, conducted by Ludovic Morlot,directed by Katie Mitchell ;
- Giuseppe Verdi : Un Ballo in maschera, conducted by Carlo Rizzi, directed by Alex Ollé ;
- Sergei Rachmaninov : Aleko, The Miserly Knight and Francesca da Rimini, conducted by Mikhail Tatarnikov, directed by Kirsten Dehlholm.

and in concert :
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart : Die Entführung aus dem Serail, conducted by René Jacobs ;
- Franz Schubert : Fierrabras, conducted by Adam Fischer ;
- Giovanni Paisiello : Il Barbiere di Siviglia, conducted by René Jacobs ;
- Frank Martin : Le Vin herbé, conducted by Hans-Christoph Rademann.

1 world première : Penthesilea ;
4 new productions : Daphne, Don Giovanni, Jakob Lenz and the Rachmaninov trilogy ;
3 revivals : Tamerlano (first performed in Stockholm in 2000, then in Munich in 2008), Alcina (first performed in Stockholm in 2000, then in Amsterdam in 2005) and Un Ballo in maschera (first performed in January 2013).

Since 2007, the following operas received their world première performances in Brussels :
- Luc Brewaeys, L'Uomo dal fiore in bocca, in February 2007 ;
- Benoît Mernier,  Frühlings Erwachen, in March 2007 ;
- Pierre Bartholomée, La Lumière Antigone, in April 2008 ;
- Kris Defoort, House of the Sleeping Beauties, in May 2009 ;
- Toshio Hosokawa, Matsukaze, in May 2011 ;
- Benoît Mernier, La Dispute, in March 2013 ;
- Howard Moody, Sindbad - A Journey through Living Flames, in February 2014 ;
- Philippe Boesmans, Au Monde, in March 2014.

With an average of one new opera every season, La Monnaie in Brussels remains one of the most interesting opera theatres in Europe.