Georg Zeppenfeld

Capriccio is the final opera by Richard Strauss, completed in 1942, and is subtitled "A Conversation Piece for Music." The opera explores the debate between the importance of words and music through the story of Countess Madeleine, who is courted by a poet and a composer, ultimately leaving the question of which art form is superior unresolved.

The new Bayreuth production of the Ring Cycle that premiered in 2013 offered spectacular sets, courtesy of Aleksandar Denić. As is regularly the case in Frank Castorf's productions, live video recordings add an extra dimension and in this performance Die Walküre is set at the beginning in the 19th century and then moves ahead to the Stalin era. The geographic setting is Baku, Azerbaijan, so in addition to Wild West capitalism, Castorf also takes aim at Soviet communism. The leading roles are also strongly cast in this third revival of Castorf's production, with Christopher Ventris, Heidi Melton, Catherine Foster and John Lundgren.

German composer Richard Wagner wrote Parsifal, which is a three-act opera that tells the story of the title character's quest to save the Knights of the Holy Grail by returning the Holy Spear, healing King Amfortas, and carrying out the sacred ceremony of uncovering the Holy Grail.

The former corsair Simon Boccanegra has risen to power in Genoa but carries the burden of personal loss and old rivalries. He is unexpectedly reunited with his long-lost daughter, and their renewed bond becomes entangled with conflicts involving noble families, love and revenge. Simon struggles to preserve peace in the city while protecting those closest to him. Can he overcome betrayal and reconcile the forces tearing his world apart before it is too late?

Fierrabras of 1823 is the last of Franz Schubert’s stage works. Rarely performed to this day, this heroic-romantic opera has now been staged for the first time ever at the Salzburg Festival by famous director Peter Stein. Based on an old French 12th-century epic, the plot depicts the military conflict between Christians and Moors at the time of Charlemagne – as a backdrop to stories of love and friendship that prove to be stronger than war and hatred of otherness. The strong cast includes the “marvellously expressive miracle Dorothea Röschmann” (Die Zeit) and “Michael Schade, who exudes his exceptional tenor in Fierrabras’s heroic arias” (Der neue Merker). Under the energetic baton of lngo Metzmacher, the Vienna Philharmonic unfold “the melos, the poetry, the sweetness and the dramatic force of Schubert’s highly refined and atmospheric sound worlds” (Kleine Zeitung) in highly romantic fashion.

Live performance from the Salzburg Festival, 6 August 2012.

A dream came true at Dresden's Semperoper in May 2016 when opera superstars Piotr Beczala and Anna Netrebko made their Wagner debuts as Lohengrin and Elsa, inspired to take on their new roles by Christian Thielmann, the Dresden Staatskapelle's principal conductor and one of the leading Wagner conductors of our day. Die Welt described the performance captured here as "musically one of the finest Lohengrins of all time". Contributing to the triumph are Evelyn Herlitzius's Ortrud. Tomasz Konieczny's Telramund, Georg Zeppenfeld's King Henry and the Dresden State Opera Chorus.