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The Teatro Real will open its next season a little later than usual. The first premiere on its boards will be held on October 21. It will be the emblematic Aida verdiana, in the hands of the specialist Nicola Luisotti, the one that gives the starting gun. The reason for the delay is due to the works to change the stage flooring of the Madrid Coliseum, which has already endured 25 years of performances (we count since its reopening in 1997). A minor setback for a theater that has obtained a doctorate in bobbin lace during these two pandemic yearscarrying out operas of enormous scope when everything around conspired to bring them down.
In any case, Madrid’s operómaniacs will not have to wait that long to taste the lyrical food prepared by Joan Matabosch, artistic director of the Teatro Real, who has highlighted the fact that 41% of the planned titles (7 operas out of 17) belong to the 20th and 21st centuries. So much ‘modernity’ is certainly not common, since the preponderance of the nineteenth century is still in force in opera houses. The work that triggers the lyrical battery will be precisely Orpheusby Philip Glass, on September 21 at the Teatros del Canal.
Minimalism with American roots will be present twice. Apart from the Glass piece, you can see Nixon in China, by John Adams, which recreates the historic visit of the Yankee president to the Asian giant. In two planes: one public, outside doors, and another private, inside doors. “It goes from irony to human depth”, pointed out Matabosch, who has also warned that it is the most performed American opera in the last 35 years. Ivor Bolton will stand in front of the pit for the occasion.
But we must return to the myth of Orpheus, foundational for music, because it has a particular role, given that three versions of it will be offered. In addition to Glass’s, which is the most recent, we must mention Claudio Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo, which will be in the hands of choreographer Sasha Waltz (the show is also included in the dance section of the season due to its amphibious nature). Everything merges on stage: musicians, singers and dancers. One more step in this mestizo line that Waltz already announced at the Real with Dido and Aeneas. And then there is Orfeo ed Euridice, which will be wielded, in concert version, by maestro René Jacobs.
Another particularly striking aspect is the commitment to their own heritage, which some voices had voices considered scarce in the billboard from previous seasons. Nothing less than four titles with a national seal coincide in this one. Let’s enumerate. Crownsof baroque zarzuela of Sebastian Duronwith a tone between tragic and burlesque (concert version, yes). The altarpiece of Master Pedroof Manuel de Fallawho will direct Pablo Heras-Married (concert version, yes). Dialogues of Tirant and Carmesinaby Joan Magrané (with libretto by Marc Rosich), in production from the Castell de Peralada Festival and the Liceo de Barcelona.
Achilles’ rescue
And finally, Achilles in Skiros, a montage that the pandemic left on the verge of seeing the light after an arduous recovery work in which Ivor Bolton and the musicologist Gonzalo Torrente were particularly involved. “We have fitted it into the program because we were impatient to see it”, confessed Joan Matabosch, who pointed out another relevant detail: the Theater an der Wien has joined as co-producer, so that the opera by Corselli, a composer born in Italy but who lived more than 40 years in Spain, will have projection beyond our borders. Centered on Achilles’ passage from inconsequential adolescence to the tribulations of adulthood and with a libretto by the prolific Metastasio, the story will be narrated on stage signed by Mariame Clement. And with Bolton, of course, leading the orchestra. Countertenor Franco Fagioli will be the Greek hero.
More milestones for the coming months. The return of Christopher Loy with Richard Strauss, after his captivating Whim of 2019. The German regista will now raise Arabella, which, curiously, has not been performed in Madrid to date (neither at Real nor at Zarzuela). A portrait of 1920s Vienna whose aristocrats, like on the Titanic, dance and drink while the civilization they know is about to shatter under the Nazi boot. Speaking of tyrannies, we also have Nose of Shostakovich, that the Soviet regime tore from the repertoire when it caught the merciless satire that it made of its administration. “Shostakovich put her on the same level as the tsarist,” Matabosch clarified. Regime change but not old defects such as arrogance, careerism, ignorance…
There will be no shortage of impeccable values from the history of opera such as Tristan and Isolde by Wagner, The Turk in Italy by Rossini, The sleepwalker of Bellini, Turandot of Puccini and the aforementioned Aida. In the dance chapter, apart from the aforementioned Sasha Waltz, the National Dance Company (with Morning; by Nacho Duato), the New York City Ballet and the English National Ballet with Tamara Rojo in the lead. Claims, therefore, abundant and qualified to study the most suitable subscription to the taste of each one.
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