It is hard to believe, but Gaetano Donizetti’s lyrical tragedy, premiered in 1844 in Naples, has never before been performed in a German opera house. The story deals with the Queen of Cyprus, who came from a noble Venetian family, and the work is full of entrancingly beautiful, almost soulful music. The Klangvokal Musikfestival, always ready to push the boundaries, is now including this operatic rarity in its programme. It will be performed on 11 June 2022 in the Konzerthaus Dortmund with hand-picked vocal soloists and the Rundfunkchor and Funkhausorchester conducted by Giacomo Sagripanti. The Stadttheater Gießen is going a step further and presents “Caterina Cornaro” on 27 November 2022 as the first staged performance in German-speaking countries, directed by Anna Drescher and conducted by Vladimir Yaskorski.

A German opera in a cosmopolitan spirit, that is Gaspare Spontini’s opera “Agnes von Hohenstaufen” premiered in 1827 in Berlin. Now the Theater Erfurt is taking on this spectacular work.

The master concerts associated with the Heidenheim Opera Festival present a very special event this autumn: the well-known German actress Katharina Thalbach will play the (spoken) title role in Georg Anton Benda’s famous melodrama “Medea”, accompanied by the Cappella Aquileia under the direction of Marcus Bosch. The concert on 27 October in the Congress Zentrum Heidenheim, repeated on 28 October in Fürth, is at the same time the first performance using the critical new edition published by Bärenreiter. Benda’s “Medea” will be heard in the previously unknown late Mannheim version of 1784, which is in many respects more effective. The edition has been edited for the first time by Jörg Krämer for the series “OPERA – Spectrum of European Musical Theatre in Separate Editions.” (Picture: Eugène Delacroix, Medea kills her children (1862), Louvre Paris)

“Naïs”, the lavish opera the French composer wrote for the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, is now being published as part of the “Opera omnia Rameau”.

A contemporary regarded Handel’s opera “Berenice” as just a patchwork, but it has many little gems to offer. In May “Berenice” will be performed again on the operatic stage in Halle.

Handel’s serenata “Parnasso in festa” is a true pasticcio with many re-uses from works composed earlier. Nevertheless, a staged performance, as is planned for the Handel Festival Halle in Bad Lauchstädt is extremely worthwhile.

A confusing plot with a happy ending – that’s Baroque opera, that’s Handel. And it’s the same with “Arianna in Creta”. The Halle Handel Edition of the work offers a whole range of possibilities for the stage.