Okka von der Damerau

The theatre masterpiece by Antonin Dvořák, written in 1900, is a recurrent title on the season programmes of major European and American theatres. Strangely enough, it has never been performed at La Scala. The ambiguous fairy tale about a nymph who takes human form for the love of a prince who will betray her and only repent at death is fertile ground for the much awaited return of Emma Dante, whose career took wing precisely at La Scala with a felicitous production of Carmen. Making their debuts Piermarini’s auditorium, on the other hand, are the director of the Welsh National Opera Tomáš Hanus, a specialist in this repertoire, while Olga Bezsmertna will be in the title role.

The French tale of a beautiful young woman destroyed by her conflicting needs for love and luxury.

The plot of Die Fledermaus is woven around a ball given by Prince Orlofsky.

The first-ever audio-visual recording of this opera – directed by Christof Loy, conducted by Marc Albrecht and with Sara Jakubiak, Brian Jagde and Josef Wagner in the leading roles

A couple and their hallucinatory journey to the dark side of passion. Renata is driven by a longing for the consummate sexual encounter. Since her youth she has had a vision of an ecstatic conjugation with a shining angel. Ruprecht falls for Renata and follows her unreservedly on her obsessive quest to fulfil this fantasy. The couple cross the boundaries of perception, leaving behind all traces of morality or reason, until their willingness to devote body and soul completely to one another threatens to pull their previous existence apart.

Recorded at Bayerische Staatsoper on March 3-9, 2016.

Rusalka is not a happily tragic fairy tale. Rusalka’s lake is a dark, damp cellar, where she is imprisoned with her sisters by her abusive father. But once she finally escapes, she is thrown mute and alone into an equally brutal world where she is utterly unequipped to survive, and he increasingly looks like a protector.