Dramaturge

In order to free her husband Florestan, Leonore disguises herself as a male prison guard and sneaks into a prison. Beethoven’s only opera is infused with an unwavering belief in the power of hope. The powerful liberation music at the end anticipates the «Ode to Joy» from his Ninth Symphony. Andreas Homoki separates the plot from its bourgeois comic light opera context, focusing instead on the utopian idea of world brotherhood and the universal themes of humanity that Beethoven chose as his central focus. Klaus Florian Vogt, one of the most outstanding tenors of our time, will appear as Florestan.

Fidelio

Zurich Opera House

Elsa of Brabant is suspected of having killed her younger brother Gottfried in the forest. When King Henry the Fowler asks Elsa to defend herself, she pleads for an imaginary knight to come to her aid. Suddenly, Lohengrin, the Knight of the Swan, appears. He promises to fight for Elsa, but makes her promise beforehand never to question him about his identity or provenance.

Lohengrin

Hamburg State Opera

Romantic opera in three acts by Richard Wagner (1813-1883)
Libretto by the composer

EPSG:4326

Opernhaus Zürich

Once the best marksman in the world, Max is on a losing streak. A single shot will determine his betrothal to Agathe – a much too important matter to leave to chance. At midnight in the Wolf’s Glen, Max, aided by the evil Casper, casts seven magic bullets which never miss their target, thus sealing a pact with the devil. Following the work’s premiere in 1821, Carl Maria von Weber proclaimed: »I’ve hit the hit the bullseye«. Soon »Der Freischütz« became regarded as the romantic German opera par excellence. Weber’s music reproduces the beauty of the German forest as well as its nighttime eeriness to create an atmosphere of uncertainty, doubt and fear. In his production, director Axel Köhler not only describes the fate of a young man driven to extremes by a fear of failure, but also paints the image of a society which, having lost its bearings, seeks stability in ritual and hierarchy. 

Der Freischütz Carl Maria von Weber

Semperoper Dresden

Opera in two acts by Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 - 1827)
Libretto by Joseph Ferdinand Sonnleithner and Georg Friedrich Treitschke

Finnish soprano Camilla Nylund thrilled as Brünnhilde in the new Zurich Ring des Nibelungen, and now she returns to Zurich as Senta. Her stage partner here is Tomasz Koniezcny, who will sing the title role in this revival and who celebrated his own triumph in the Zurich Ring when he took the stage as Wotan. General Music Director Gianandrea Noseda, meanwhile, showed with the Zurich Ring that he is a fantastic Wagner conductor. He now takes over the musical direction of this revival production.

Der fliegende Holländer

In Brave New World in 1932, the loyal Freudian Aldous Huxley had one of his characters describe families as turbo-incubators of human neuroses, in whose warm, humid climate one could only go crazy. In the case of the Atride family, whose psychosocial abnormalities were addressed by Richard Strauss and Hugo von Hofmannsthal in 1909, one generation hands the ax to the next: Clytemnestra avenges the sacrifice of her daughter Iphigenia on her husband Agamemnon, Elektra uses her brother Orestes to murder her the mother and her lover Aegisthus, only sister Chrysothemis longs for home and hearth. Peter Konwitschny lets the children watch the patricide in the bathtub. But the retribution will be anything but liberation.

Electra

The Staatstheater Stuttgart

"Die Walküre" takes us from the mythical realm of the gods into the world of men: Siegmund and Sieglinde are consumed by a forbidden love that defies all laws and threatens to undermine Wotan's power plan. In his conflict with Fricka, the father of the gods recognizes his hero's lack of freedom and sacrifices him. Brünnhilde's defiance is severely punished: Wotan puts her into a deep sleep and encircles her with a ring of fire that only a fearless hero can traverse. With the "Ride of the Valkyries" and the "Magic Fire," the music of "Die Walküre" contains some of the most famous passages of the "Ring." Camilla Nylund and Eric Cutler sing Brünnhilde and Siegmund in this continuation of the Zurich "Ring" interpretation by Andreas Homoki and Gianandrea Noseda.

Dramaturge

Werner Hintze

Events

Upcoming events

3 - 16 May, 2026

Fidelio · Opernhaus Zürich

Jan 24 - Feb 6, 2027

The Valkyrie · Opernhaus Zürich

Past events

3 - 16 May, 2026

Fidelio · Opernhaus Zürich

Mar 22 - Apr 11, 2026

Lohengrin · Staatsoper Hamburg

About

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