Elena Tsallagova

In the forest, the animals and insects are playing and dancing. The Forester enters and lies down against a tree for a nap. A curious Vixen Cub inquisitively chases a frog right into the lap of the surprised forester who forcibly takes the vixen home as a pet. Time passes and we see the Vixen, now grown up into a young adult tied up in the forester's yard with the conservative old dachshund. Fed up with life in confinement, the vixen chews through her rope and runs off to freedom.

Debussy's masterpiece, for the first time conducted by the Paris Opera's music director Philippe Jordan, in the fairy staging by Robert Wilson. When Prince Golaud, grandson of King of Allemonde, meets the beautiful Mélisande, he knows nothing about her. Though, he marries her. A few months later, Golaud announces his wedding to his brother Pelléas, who seems to be falling in love with the woman.

Known as a creator of astonishing images, stage director and visual artist Robert Wilson delivers a magnificent production of Mozart’s adaption of Handel’s Messias. Mozart was commissioned by Gottfried van Swieten to modernise the score fifty years after Handel’s popular composition (1742), mainly by arranging the wind parts and partially re-composing them. With Marc Minkowski a conductor has been engaged who understands perfectly how to combine baroque style with the tonal possibilities of an orchestra of the classical period like the Musiciens du Louvre. The excellent soloist quartet with Elena Tsallagova, Wiebke Lehmkuhl, Richard Croft and José Coca Loza merges perfectly into Wilson’s enormous flood of images.

Based on Oscar Wildes story The Birthday of the Infanta, Zemlinskys single-act opera Der Zwerg is the tragic tale of a dwarf who is presented at court, falls in love with the beautiful Donna Clara, but is ultimately forced to see himself as others see him and to die of a broken heart. Preceded by Schoenbergs Accompaniment to a Cinematographic Scene, Op. 34, Zemlinskys Romantic score is full of psychological intrigue. Is Der Zwerg a critique of societys superficiality? Is it the composers self-portrait in his doomed affair with Alma Schindler? Director Tobias Kratzers stunning, transparent production creates a space in which each character is thrown into sharp relief in this fine, noble and melancholy work.