Name: 1st La Scintilla Concert
Start: 2025-11-10T19:30:00
Location: Zurich Opera House

Emmanuelle Haïm

Orchestra La Scintilla

Opernhaus Zürich

In William Shakespeare's drama "Romeo and Juliet," the power of love allows two young people to transcend their limitations. The lovers of Verona have conquered the ballet stage thanks to the music of Sergei Prokofiev. He masterfully captured the clash of love and hate, and the juxtaposition of tenderness and violence, in his vibrant, passionate score. Cathy Marston brings the world's most famous love story to the stage with the Zurich Ballet as a world of contrasts, where everything can change in an instant: around the next corner awaits the love of your life, or perhaps death itself.

Romeo and Juliet

A bottle labeled "Drink me!" that shrinks you, a cake that makes you grow immeasurably after you eat it, a Mad Hatter who celebrates his unbirthday 364 days a year – these and many other curious adventures await Alice after she follows a rabbit and falls down a hole. Is it all really just a dream? Lewis Carroll's classic children's book has captivated generations of theater and filmmakers, including the Italian composer Pierangelo Valtinoni. His poetic music, as well as Nadja Loschky's imaginative and fast-paced direction, thrilled audiences at the Zurich premiere.

Alice in Wonderland

Elektra relentlessly invokes the past, her trauma, her burning desire for revenge: Her father Agamemnon, barely back from the Trojan War, is dead, murdered in his bath by her mother Clytemnestra and her lover Aegisthus. Richard Strauss wrote music of piercing power, profound and relentless, which offers no redemption to any of the characters until Elektra's ecstatic final dance. Following her visually stunning production of "Der Rosenkavalier" at the Zurich Opera House, director Lydia Steier now turns her attention to Strauss's dark counterpart. On the podium is the Lausanne-born conductor and designated Zurich General Music Director Lorenzo Viotti. In the demanding title role, Finnish soprano Miina-Liisa Värelä makes her Zurich debut.

Elektra

With "Das Rheingold," Richard Wagner opens his monumental "Ring of the Nibelung": a mythological world theater about power, love, and the loss of innocence. Whoever renounces love gains power. This fateful law draws both Alberich and the god Wotan into the spell of the cursed ring. From the famous depths of E-flat major, a world unfolds between idyllic nature and moral decay. Andreas Homoki's successful production returns under the musical direction of Gianandrea Noseda. Michael Volle sings Wotan.

Das Rheingold

The extensive concert program presents itself with dazzling diversity and a variety of formats. The Zurich Opera Orchestra, in full force, will perform in seven Philharmonic Concerts, alternating between the Opera House and the Tonhalle. Internationally renowned soloists and guest conductors will dedicate themselves to major works from Beethoven to Strauss, as well as fascinating discoveries from the concert repertoire. A special highlight is the Prokofiev Cycle, created in collaboration with the Tonhalle Orchestra.

4th Chamber Concert

With "Manon Lescaut," Giacomo Puccini established a series of tragic female figures in whom passionate devotion and existential despair are intertwined. In four large, cinematically edited scenes, he depicts the stages of the title character's life: her intoxicating love for the student Des Grieux, a life in luxurious Parisian society, and finally, exile and death in an American desert. Director Barrie Kosky underscores the fleeting nature of this life by presenting the narrative as a continuous, feverish journey: Death is already on the coachman's seat at Manon and Des Grieux's first encounter. Following her acclaimed Tosca, soprano Sonya Yoncheva returns to the Zurich Opera House as Manon.

Manon Lescaut

The extensive concert program presents itself with dazzling diversity and a variety of formats. The Zurich Opera Orchestra, in full force, will perform in seven Philharmonic Concerts, alternating between the Opera House and the Tonhalle. Internationally renowned soloists and guest conductors will dedicate themselves to major works from Beethoven to Strauss, as well as fascinating discoveries from the concert repertoire. 

Bryn Terfel recital

plendor and misery lie close together in the life of the courtesan Violetta Valéry. Celebrated as an enigmatic beauty at lavish Parisian parties, she is forced to abandon her great love for Alfredo due to bourgeois conventions. With this opera about a "whore," as Giuseppe Verdi himself called her, he shocked the audiences of his time. His sharp critique is directed against the hypocritical practices of society, while he imbues Violetta herself, on her path of suffering, with the aura of a saint. With keen psychological insight, director Christof Loy draws inspiration from the aesthetics of Verdi's era. Under the direction of Joana Mallwitz, the young Spanish soprano Marina Monzó makes her debut in the title role.

La traviata

2nd Concert La Scintilla

Hanna Glawari is the woman around whom everything revolves: emancipated, beautiful, intelligent, and the heiress of 20 million. Desired in Paris, she is destined for only one man, who simply cannot bring himself to utter the words "I love you." Director Barrie Kosky staged this ambiguous and successful early modern operetta with great opulence. Alongside quirky slapstick and revue flair, he highlights the waltz-infused nostalgia and the emotional depth of the piece. Soprano Diana Damrau makes her role debut in the title role in this revival.

The Merry Widow

The extensive concert program presents itself with dazzling diversity and a variety of formats. The Zurich Opera Orchestra, in full force, will perform in seven Philharmonic Concerts, alternating between the Opera House and the Tonhalle. Internationally renowned soloists and guest conductors will dedicate themselves to major works from Beethoven to Strauss, as well as fascinating discoveries from the concert repertoire.

Fuchs & Jordan

The very title of this two-part ballet promises an evening of contrasts: tempo versus slowness. In 2027, the ballet world will celebrate Jiří Kylián's 80th birthday. For over three decades, he shaped the profile of Nederlands Dans Theater, which, under his direction, has developed into one of the world's leading contemporary ballet companies. The Prague native has also been associated with the Zurich Ballet since 1997. In slow motion, six figures move through his piece "Last Touch First," reminiscent of Chekhov and Ibsen. On the fine line between perceived movement and immobility, psychodramas full of desire, despair, and pathos unfold. Canadian-born Stephanie Lake is one of the most important dance figures in her adopted home of Australia. She is resident choreographer of the Australian Ballet and resident choreographer with the Semperoper Ballet. With her Melbourne-based Stephanie Lake Company, she tours the world. In her creations, she explores the relationship between the individual and the collective. She is choreographing a fast-paced group piece for the Zurich Ballet to a new score by Robin Fox, dominated by percussion instruments.