Name: Festspiel-Liederabend Jonas Kaufmann
Start: 2026-07-13T19:00:00
Location: Max-Joseph-Platz

Helmut Deutsch

Jonas Kaufmann

Bayerische Staatsoper

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

Max-Joseph-Platz

The U.S. Forces show their presence world-wide: American Lieutenant Pinkerton has an affair in Nagasaki with Cio-Cio San, "Madame Butterfly". He sails away. She then has his child. Three years later he returns to Japan – accompanied by his American wife and wants to take the child with him. Butterfly commits suicide.

Madama Butterfly

Seeing his love succeed against the will of the parents is pretty difficult in a rural setting. Especially when he is also considered an outsider, things do not look good with the parents-in-law, and there's a lot of money in the mix as well. But what Hans negotiates with Kezal the marriage broker, without discussing it with his beloved Marie, certainly requires a very special kind of chutzpah, and it very nearly goes all wrong – bartering his loved one to a certain person, which turns out through rhetorical trickery to be himself, only becomes evident as a good idea at the end. Which once again proves: The comedy is only a tragedy avoided at the very last minute.

The Bartered Bride

On his futile search for the meaning of life, the ageing scholar Faust makes a pact with the Devil. Méphistophélès buys his soul and promises him eternal youth and love. Faust falls in love with Marguerite, however she soon leaves him. After she has killed their child, Marguerite succumbs to madness, but emerges morally superior from the encounter with Faust.

Faust

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 2

Artist House

"How beautiful Princess Salome is tonight!". Oscar Wilde's French drama, arranged as opera text by the composer himself, was a stroke of genius of the fin de siècle, a scandal on one hand and an absolute hit on the other, both an artistic and a financial success which allowed Richard Strauss to buy his villa in Garmisch. Salome demands the head of the prophet, John the Baptist, who has rejected her, from her lustful stepfather – and bound by an oath, he cannot deny her. And so the zealous admonisher dies, and with him the princess is undone – "Kill this woman!". Krzysztof Warlikowski is convinced that Salome recounts many of the contradictions of the period of origin, that in this piece, however, much is also dismissed of that which at the time was still the future: "It's not just what's in the work of art itself that is important, whether it be Oscar Wilde or Richard Strauss, but rather the whole context, which Christianity and the history of the 20th century add to this piece."

Salome

A sovereign may do as he wishes. His entire surroundings depend on him, no-one is entitled to contradict him, all must suffer his moods. Only one may hold a mirror to him, is even obliged to criticise the ruler – the jester. But what happens when this fool neglects his most important task and puts himself at the service of the moral excesses exemplified by the tyrant? In his play Le Roi s’amuse (The King Amuses Himself), the French dramatist Victor Hugo went through this starting position with an unscrupulous fun-lover as the king, and a fool whose spiritual deformation has manifested itself in a hunchback.

Rigoletto

Dressed as a man and calling herself “Fidelio”, Leonore surreptitiously gains the confidence of the jailer Rocco and his daughter Marzelline, thus gaining access to the high security tract where her husband Florestan has been despotically incarcerated by Don Pizarro. Florestan is in mortal danger, but this does not intimidate his wife, who is determined to liberate him. Finally, however, the two of them can only be rescued by an emissary from the monarch. At the end, a Utopia in the form of a final chorus sets the stage aglow, not only as a plea for freedom and justice, but also concurrently as a condemnation of the anxieties and restrictions of human existence.

Fidelio

Portrait Concert 3

Elektra's father: murdered. Her mother and her paramour Ägisth were his murderers. The disheveled Elektra is determined to avenge the parricide. She has the axe for the deed but not the strength. Then her brother Orest appears … Armor-plated emotions! – whipped up by a gigantic orchestra. An aristocratic cast of singers. An enthusiastically cheered staging by Herbert Wernicke. A shattering drama of the Soul.

Elektra

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.