She lives in the here and now, one of the best-known heroines in operatic history, she makes sergeant Don José lose his mind, throwing his life into confusion. His attempts to make her tow the line fail because she can’t be tied down. They gradually drive each other into corners. Bizet’s music brings the differences in their perceptions of love and relationships into contrast again and again: Their downfall starts with light-hearted operetta music, but ends in tragedy. Barrie Kosky’s production quickly achieved cult status after it blasted onto the stage in  2015, and has lost none of its impact, taking the most performed opera in the world back to its roots - Opéra comique. The story’s interspersed and told using concise texts, steering us towards its tragic end. En route, romantic, amusing moments and wonderful dance routines share the stage. Kosky’s vision is fascinating, toying masterfully with usual Carmen and Spanish clichés.

EPSG:4326

Carmen

Oper Frankfurt

Elderly King Mitridate wants to marry again, but suspects his sons might dispute his right to his beloved Aspasia and the throne. He therefore spreads the rumour that he died in battle after being defeated by the Romans. Sure enough, his older son Farnace starts pressurising his father’s young intended bride to marry him. But Aspasia secretly loves Sifare, his younger brother, who she asks to protect her from Farnace’s advances. The King of Pontus, believed to be dead, returns in the company of Irene, whom Farnace once promised to marry. Everyone starts eyeing each up other suspiciously. Farnace, in league with the Romans, plots against his father while Sifare und Aspasia are torn between their love for one another and loyalty to Mitridate. Left at the mercy of the King’s jealousy, their desperation brings them close to death.

Mitridate, Re di Ponto

The last hours of the singer Flora Tosca and artist Mario Cavaradossi's passionate love: they couldn’t escape the vortex of power and violence. Their attempts to break free from the unscrupulous Police Chief Scarpia’s system were in vain. The strength in Puccini’s opera lies in striking portrayals of extreme emotions, violence, jealousy and persecution. The composer decided on this work while watching a performance of Victorien Sardou’s play, with Sarah Bernhardt as Tosca. His music lives in the keenly sketched characters, their outpourings contrasting with lyrical moments. Director Andreas Kriegenburg homed in on their private lives, while liberating the characters from clichés: they could be people of today, broken by a brutal police state. Strong visual effects and detailed portraits of the three key protagonists turn his production into a study of the abuse of power and resistance.

Tosca

Mozart and his librettist, and kindred spirit, Lorenzo da Ponte’s third opera revolves around six people. The lives of two couples are thrown into confusion in the space of 24 hours: Guglielmo and Ferrando are persuaded to make a bet with cynical Don Alfonso about their lovers’ Fiordiligi and Dorabella’s fidelity. Don Alfonso’s convinced that, with their maid Despina's help, he can prove both sisters are fickle. The young men dress up as foreigners, to seduce their best friend’s lovers. Feigned and real emotions start getting all mixed up. The »wrong« couples even celebrate a sham double wedding, before the sisters discover their husbands' true identities. All six draw seemingly happy and conciliatory conclusions, but the laughter sticks in their throats. Can things return to how they were? Which feelings were and are real anyway?

Così fan tutte

Podcast link: https://youtu.be/4hagYvrYbuM

The Artelize Podcast and Kasper Holten - Pedefining Opera for the modern world

Podcast link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d36M5Hi6O80

The Artelize Podcast - A legacy of innovation in Opera: Celebrating Marc A. Scorca

Podcast link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59E40S_EQSY

The Artelize Podcast: A love letter that was never sent

Podcast link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THv6htilWtI

The Artelize Podcast and Adolfo Corrado: Mediterranean flavors, opera and social media

The Academy of St Martin in the Fields join Music Director Joshua Bell for a tour of Europe with a programme including Kevin Puts’ extraordinary Earth – a contribution to Joshua’s ‘Elements’ project, consisting of five new commissions shaped around water, air, fire, space and earth. Shaped around a four-note ostinato and the lyrical phrases that are traded between the violin and orchestra, Puts’ work is an example of the stability and endurance of this element, as well as acting as a reverent tribute to the planet Earth.

ASMF & Joshua Bell Europe

HCC Hannover Congress Centrum

Alte Oper

Elbphilharmonie Hamburg

Museum Ludwig

Beethoven Hall (Beethovensaal)

Wiener Konzerthaus

Whether it's raining, storming, or snowing outside, we'll play our way into spring! The New Year's Concert of the Neue Philharmonie Frankfurt features waltzes, polkas, marches, arias, and duets, lively and melodious music by Johann Strauss, Robert Stolz, Paul Lincke, and many other masters of light music. The great tradition of the Viennese New Year's Concerts will be duly honored, with gems by Vivaldi and Dvořák, and delicacies like "Veronika, der Lenz ist da" (Veronica, Spring Is Here) and the brilliant "Frühlingsstimmenwalzer " (Spring Voices Waltz) – the finest entertainment all about spring.

Concert for the New Year 2026 – When the white lilac blooms again

This petite American soprano with an enormous voice is back in Frankfurt, where she thrilled audiences in recent seasons as Tchaikovsky's Iolanta and Cio-Cio-San in Madama Butterfly, for this recital. Recent opportunities for her versatile abilities to shine included appearances at the Aix-en-Provence Festival,  where she can be heard again soon in a Gluck double-bill as young Iphigenie in Aulis and the older Iphigenie auf Tauris. She sang the title role in Janáček's Katja Kabanová, one of her finest roles, at the Salzburg Festival (get the DVD), in Munich, Stuttgart, Rome, Geneva, Brno and Seattle. Get a copy of her debut CD:Canción amorosa - with Lieder from Spain. She's putting together a special programme for Frankfurt, inspired by Nadezhda von Meck (1831 - 1894), a Russian amateur musician and valued confidante and patron of Tchaikovsky and Debussy, who also influenced Janáček and Glière.

Corinne Winters (soprano) & Simon Lepper (piano)

Mendelssohn was influenced less by Prussian austerity and dramatic pathos than his comprehensive education, evangelical piety and, in musical terms, adherence to classical form. The three movements in his violin concerto flow seamlessly into one another. We're delighted that Arabella Steinbacher is back, playing one of the most popular violin concertos there is.

5th Sunday & Monday Symphonic Concerts

The title of this series of concerts– »Happy New Ears« – was something John Cage once wished his audience instead of Happy New Year. Cage, along with Luigi Nono, who taught him, and Karlheinz Stockhausen were among those to have influenced Helmut Lachenmann most. He turns 90 on November 27 this year; a chance to honour one of the most important composers of the 20th and 21st centuries with a portrait concert. He's been trying to broaden horizons across the board with his distinct sound world and challenging concepts of art and music for nearly 70 years. »Art is not an expression of what defines time, but what it lacks,« he said and, with Beethoven in mind: »a metamorphosis of magical, familiar experiences triggered by a spiritually charged, creative driving force« - something that fascinates him.

Happy New Ears

HfMDK Frankfurt

His last, great symphony in C major "has resonated among us like none since Beethoven's," wrote Schumann, who so deeply revered Schubert's symphonic legacy. With Kent Nagano, it finds a conductor here who, like few others, can open ears anew to this singular masterpiece. Kent Nagano, however, always brings contemporary music to the forefront. He is particularly fond of the music of Henri Dutilleux, who died in 2013 at the age of 97: Dutilleux was considered the last French classic of modernism and a composer who valued lyricism, poetry, and iridescent timbre. And, as is especially true of the cello concerto "Tout un monde lointain…", the virtuosity—the cello, under the hands of Jan Vogler, is required to perform truly acrobatic feats. Yet Dutilleux never lost touch with his listeners. He, who can be considered the heir of Maurice Ravel in particular, once said that for every young composer there is "the moment when he has to, so to speak, kill his father. Perhaps I haven't done that thoroughly enough. But perhaps that's precisely why my music is more accessible to the public. Although it was never my intention to be understood. I'm simply searching for my absolute truth."

Schubert Symphony in C major

With a captivating program, the hr-Symphony Orchestra's chamber concert enriches this season's Lauterbach Hohhaus Concerts. Franz Schubert's "Arpeggione" Sonata is among the Viennese Romantic composer's most famous chamber works. Its sonorous soundscape makes it a truly virtuosic piece, which can be experienced alongside two brilliantly compelling chamber music works from the early years of the great operatic dramatist Richard Strauss. The 19-year-old Strauss's Piano Quartet in C minor is considered the pinnacle of his engagement with Brahms. His only violin sonata, composed at the age of 23, was also a stroke of genius.

Arpeggione

Hohhaus Museum Lauterbach e.V.

Hessischer Rundfunk

Introductory talks (in German) in the Holzfoyer 30 minutes before curtain up, available here shortly after opening night and everywhere where podcasts are to be found.

Amor vien dal destino

Guest performance

CityPalais

Is it a concert? Or is it a game? Does the conductor set the tone, or do you, sitting in the Alte Oper, an active participant in this music adventure game? Equally an auditory experience and an experiment, the outcome is open – but that's also part of the game's rules: the music will be magnificent, next-level, no easy mode. The soundtrack to "Game of Thrones," the powerful sounds of "Mars, Bringer of War," the "Danse Macabre," impactful classics by Elgar and Strauss – these and much more are the cornerstones of this interactive adventure game, in which concertgoers guide a story and are thus drawn ever deeper into an auditory adventure. The works of Saint-Saëns to Gustav Holst, from Sibelius to Rachmaninoff form the backdrop, sometimes epically mysterious, sometimes explosive like a final battle. The hr Symphony Orchestra is preparing to take a step into the unknown. Those who dare and embrace it will be rewarded with an experience that no streaming algorithm can offer with such intensity.

Events in Frankfurt am Main next month

Carmen

Oper Frankfurt

Mitridate, Re di Ponto

Oper Frankfurt

Tosca

Oper Frankfurt

Così fan tutte

Oper Frankfurt

The Artelize Podcast and ...

Artelize

The Artelize Podcast - A ...

Artelize

The Artelize Podcast: A l...

Artelize

The Artelize Podcast and ...

Artelize

ASMF & Joshua Bell Europe...

Academy of St. Martin in the Fields

Concert for the New Year ...

Neue Philharmonie Frankfurt

Corinne Winters (soprano)...

Oper Frankfurt

5th Sunday & Monday Symph...

Oper Frankfurt

Happy New Ears

Oper Frankfurt

Schubert Symphony in C ma...

Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra

Arpeggione

Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra

Amor vien dal destino

Oper Frankfurt

Guest performance

WDR Sinfonieorchester

Music Adventure Game

Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra