Oper Leipzig announces its 2014-15 season (MB)
Oper Leipzig has announced its 2014/15 season. There are no fewer than six new opera stagings: the first of which, Gounod’s Faust, opens in October. Nino Rota’s Aladino e la lampada magica in German translation continues the company’s commitment to children’s opera. The others are Madama Butterfly, Gordon Getty’s The Canterville Ghost, I Pagliacci, and, perhaps most the eagerly awaited of all, the third instalment of the new Leipzig Ring, as it reaches Siegfried. Ulf Schirmer conducts, Rosamund Gilmore directs, and the cast includes Christian Franz, Dan Karlström, John Lundgren, and ElisabetStrid. The first night will be on 12 April.
Siegfried will also be staged during the Wagner-Festtage 2015 (22-31 May), which will also take in Parsifal, Das Liebesverbot, the ballet EinLiebestraum, Das Rheingold, Die Walküre, a semi-staged Tannhäuser, and a symposium.
In addition to those Wagner revivals, repertoire performances will range wide: Die Zauberflöte (both a children’s version and the ‘real thing’), Nabucco, Die Frau ohneSchatten (premiered this season), Tosca, Don Pasquale, The Rake’s Progress, Rigoletto, La Traviata, Hänsel und Gretel, La Bohème and ManonLescaut.
As usual, the Gewandhaus Orchestra plays for all performances. A full list of ballet performances is also available; the three premieres are a new Rachmaninov ballet (on the second and third piano concertos), Othello, and West Side Story. Full details can be viewed on www.oper-leipzig.de.
Mark Berry