Name: Götterdämmerung (The Twilight of the Gods)
Start: 2023-02-10T16:00:00
Location: Semper Opera Dresden

Stephen Milling

Andreas Schager

Ricarda Merbeth

Anna Gabler

Markus Marquardt

Evelin Novak

Adrian Eröd

Stepanka Pucalkova

Waltraud Meier

Monika Bohinec

Simone Schröder

Daniela Kohler

Willy Decker

Wolfgang Gussmann

Jan Seeger

Semperoper Dresden

Is Carmen’s gaze only to be compared with that of a wild animal? The French writer Prosper Mérimée explored this question in his novella Carmen, which was the basis for Georges Bizet’s (1838-1875) final opera, which premiered at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 3 March 1875. Carmen’s air of seduction is both her weapon and her downfall, for in the end she dies at the hands of her jealous lover, Don José. Carmen refuses to be told what to do and certainly doesn’t want to be rescued by Don José in the shifting sands in front of the bullfighting arena. She prefers death to having her life decided by others. In the extremely popular and passionate “Habanera” aria, which is our first encounter with Carmen, she paints a picture of herself: “Love is a rebellious bird that none can tame.” Her indomitable desire for freedom is stamped in her DNA.

Carmen

When the Norns weave the thread of fate at the beginning of Richard Wagner's "Götterdämmerung," the end of the world of the gods is already certain. The hero Siegfried falls victim to an intrigue at the court of the Gibichungs, and Brünnhilde resolves to return the Ring to the Rhinemaidens. The male principle, in its insane quest for power and dominance, has destroyed itself. Only the female can oppose the impending apocalypse and develop the saving power for a new beginning. In the final part of "The Ring of the Nibelung," Richard Wagner takes up the major threads of the tetralogy once again and combines them into an apotheosis. In Willy Decker's production of Richard Wagner's drama of humanity, everything is "theater within the theater," and so the abdicated god Wotan lets the curtain fall at the end.

Götterdämmerung (The Twilight of the Gods)

Semper Opera Dresden

Götterdämmerung