Name: Die Englische Katze
Start: 2026-01-30T19:00:00
Location: Munich Residence

Katharina Wincor

Lucy Joy Altus

Meg Brilleslyper

Daniel Vening

Jess Dandy

Armand Rabot

Dafydd Jones

Elene Gvritishvili

Samuel Stopford

Seonwoo Lee

Zhe Liu

Nontobeko Bhengu

Michael Butler

Iana Aivazian

Bruno Khouri

Benedikt Zehm

Christiane Lutz

Dorothee Joisten

Christian Andre Tabakoff

Bayerische Staatsoper

Count Almaviva has himself abolished the iusprimae noctis, or "right of the lord". A fact, however, which does not prevent him from trying to seduce the Countess’s maid, Susanna, just before her marriage to Figaro. A clear case of sexual harassment. But, what happens when the culprit has plenty of money and power? Or, can even bend the law to suit their wishes? Le nozze di Figaro was more than just a comedy back in Mozart’s day. The world portrayed is brim full of criminal machinations and blatant fraud and chicanery by the powerful and almighty. Lorenzo Da Ponte’s libretto based on the scandalous play by the French revolutionary, Beaumarchais, leads the colourful characters of a comedy of the classes into situations so hopeless that emptiness and the desire to die spread to all quarters. And so the Count’s love for his new wife following their marriage suddenly goes ice-cold, although he has just recently spectacularly freed her from the clutches of her custodian. The resourceful Figaro of all people had helped him here, and in gratitude, the Count now employs him as his personal valet, perhaps as questionable compensation for Susanna’s harassment. Hardly conquered, the countess finds herself neglected and longs for either Almaviva's love or her own death. It takes a great deal of intrigue and counter-intrigue to disempower the encroaching count and allow Susanna's wedding to her beloved Figaro to take place after all.

The Marriage Of Figaro

Max-Joseph-Platz

Munich Residence

Whether the word “wave” reminds us of a beach by the sea, the radio or a football stadium – the idea of ​​energy is always in there somewhere. An energy that looks for its path and awakens the impression of liveliness. Waves often spread in circles, going out in all directions from a center point. Waves and circles play a role in a different way in the triple bill ballet program, Waves and Circles – they are extolled, are visible or are tangible.

Waves And Circles

Understanding common requirements is part of the nature of artistic work. From there on progress can be made and new work created. The three choreographers whose works form the Common Ground performance share a connection with the Nederlands Dans Theater (NDT) in The Hague. Along with a shared artistic conviction, in which humour also has its place, their choreographies are interwoven with connections filled with subtle content – and all of them have had world premieres at the NDT. The first two are inspired by music for string quartet. And the first and third pieces are each based in their own way on the concept of seduction.

Common Ground

Neither balsam, nor medicinal herbs can provide relief to the wounded and ailing Amfortas, ruler of the Grail kingdom. His path to recovery proves to be a complex one. No member of the Grail community can reclaim the spear which inflicted the wound, but only an outsider, a “pure fool”, enlightened by compassion. Only by the tip of this spear touching Amfortas’s wound can he be healed. On his journey of self-discovery, towards his destiny as chosen deliverer, Parsifal is accompanied, not only by the skilful Grail Knight Gurnemanz, but also by the enigmatic and seductive Kundry, who opens his eyes to sensuality and extrasensory experience.

Parsifal

There are few operas, which from the very first bar endure such intense pressure, few in which the temperature swings from ice-cold calculation to overheating in mere seconds. And scarcely any in which private entanglement and personal tragedy are so interwoven with political attitudes in historical accuracy. Giacomo Puccini’s Tosca has electrified audiences since its world premiere. The shock wave emitted by the opera was so strong that decades later many reactions still tend to point to the bewilderment and overpowering of those affected rather than the qualities of the piece itself and its love triangle surrounding the singer Floria Tosca, the painter Mario Cavaradossi and the chief of police Baron Scarpia. The artistic world of the protagonist couple, Tosca and Cavaradossi, is no colouristic ingredient here, but rather defines the profile of its characters – it justifies Tosca’s eccentricity, just as it does Cavaradossi’s liberality and also explains the singer’s pronounced self-confidence: The heroine of the stage becomes a heroine in real life. Scarpia’s appearance must also be understood as the emergence of his unleashed totalitarian power, and his sexual sadism still today as one of the truly scandalous moments of opera literature. The historical detail is certainly no staffage, but rather forms the, “precondition of the conflict between the representatives of two opposing social systems” (Norbert Christen) in a time of crisis. With his mish-mash of musical recognition motifs, which, with the exception of the rigid Scarpia chords, sensitively adjust to the situations, Puccini achieves a new dimension of through-composed operatic structure – in the intensive cohesion of the score, he nevertheless creates islands in which reflection compacts itself into moments of the highest possible arioso intensity.

TOSCA

In honeyed tones, Lord and Lady Macbeth reveal their passionate and bizarre emotions to us. But behind this beauty there lurks an abyss, which Verdi unveils with one of the cruelest dramas in the history of world literature. In their struggle to seize power and retain it once it has been usurped, Macbeth and his lady commit one murder after another. The unwavering nature of their desire imbues their love with a radicality that would have been unthinkable on the operatic stage before this work. “The subject matter of this opera is neither political nor religious: it is fantastic,” wrote Verdi and brought Shakespeare’s play closer to a more “romantic” reading. In actual fact, the witches, ghosts and apparitions, the eerie elements, which dominate the musical and dramatic flow, in short the whole world of this opera can be regarded as an outward image of its protagonists’ inner state.

Macbeth

In the portrait concerts of the Opera Studio, two singers and a pianist from the Opera Studio present themselves. The program consists exclusively of song repertoire, which is selected by the singers in consultation with the pianists and, along with operas, forms an important part of the vocal repertoire. The portrait concerts offer the possibility to get to know the three artists in their own way and with their history in a nice atmosphere.

Portrait Concert 4

Artist House

Variety is a scarce commodity in the glum little village depicted by Gaetano Donizetti and his librettist Felice Romani – the only prospects beyond the stifling confines of this backwater seem to be the illusion of a hero’s life as a soldier, even if it might lead to an untimely death.

L’elisir D’amore

"If you travel to India and to Central Africa, you'll hear Trovatore.“ Nine years after the triumphant first performance, Verdi's opera had achieved the worldwide popularity that moved the composer to make this comment. The fabric of the opera could hardly be more gloomy: a gypsy who wishes to avenge the death of her mother at the stake, a count who wishes to use the execution of this gypsy to strike at his rival; a horrifying truth that is revealed at the moment of death. All the ingredients of Verdi's dramatic abundance appear here: mysterious sound worlds, harsh contrasts, vocal brilliance, opulent tableaux. The cohesive narrative style gives way to the variation of suggestive musical images with which Verdi served "the most important part of the drama“: revenge.

Il Trovatore

Portrait Concert 5

The two closely related powerful women, whose graves now lie right beside each other in London’s Westminster Abbey, were “Of One Blood”, so of the same blood. Both were of course as conceivably far apart as possible during their lives. Elizabeth I ruled for almost half a century as Queen of England and Ireland, while Mary Stuart reigned over Scotland for a quarter of a century. A bitter power struggle between the Protestant hegemony and the Catholic opposition and ultimately the pressure of parliament forced the English Queen to have Mary Stuart executed.

Of One Blood

A grand decorative opera on the one hand: ancient saga! War between Rome and Gaul, but Norma is also a psychologically fine-grained chamber play about a highly complex woman in the throes of terrible conflicts: Norma, high priestess of the Druids and mistress of the Roman proconsul Pollione. When she is betrayed, this "Casta Diva", this "chaste goddess" is determined to take revenge. It all ends terribly: a love-death burning at the stake! The madness, ecstasy and beauty of total bel canto!

NORMA

As the template for his opera, Die Englische Katze (1983), Hans Werner Henze turned to a story by Honoré de Balzac from the early 1840s, illustrated by the famous caricaturist, Grandville. The libretto for Die Englische Katze was delivered by the English author Edward Bond, with whom Henze had already collaborated successfully with his previous opera, We Come to the River. If this was a passionate plea against the war, at first glance this animal parable, Die Englische Katze, appears to be apolitical, indeed, even harmless or amusing. The story about the ageing tomcat, Lord Puff, president of a vegetarian-nourishing “Royal Society for the Protection of Rats” and his young wife Minette, who falls in love with another, daring and exciting tomcat, Tom, ends tragically however, and serves as a wicked satire. Minette is drowned by the other cats, Tom is stabbed in the back, just after he has inherited a large sum of money. The insensitive, hypocritical cat society that only looks out for its own benefit gets off scot free.