Lully’s Alceste represents a milestone in French Baroque opera. With the publication of a critical edition as part of the Complete Edition, the work is now available in an authoritative form for scholars and practical performing use.

Following its premiere in 1656 Francesco Cavalli’s L’Erismena was a great success in Venice. An English version was also created. The edition being published as part of the critical edition Francesco Cavalli – Opere offers opportunities for a rediscovery.

It’s very much alive, the art form of opera. Contemporary music theatre fills the theatres, like grand opera for a large audience.

The series L’Opéra français publishes historical-critical editions of French music theatre works, which offer an authoritative basis for performances.

Andrea Lorenzo Scartazzini’s third opera follows on from his earlier works with a subject full of archaic power. Edward II was commissioned by the Deutsche Oper Berlin and receives its first performance on 19 February 2017. The opera tells a story from the England of the 14th century about King Edward II, who ruled for twenty unhappy years and left a country in chaos. Power struggles, affairs and intrigues about Edward’s homosexual relationships provide a theatrical subject matter for a drama of relationships and politics. Following Scartazzini’s successful collaboration with the librettist Thomas Jonigk on Der Sandmann, the team comes together again with director Christof Loy for this production. Thomas Søndergård conducts.

A critical edition of Jules Massenet’s Werther with all the authentic versions, taking all the sources into consideration including previously unavailable manuscripts, has long been overdue. The American musicologist Lesley Wright, professor at the University of Hawaii and a distinguished expert in the area of 19th century French opera, has worked on this edition for the last several years. Now it will be put to the test at the Zurich Opera, in close collaboration with the conductor Cornelius Meister. Tatjana Gürbaca is the director in the new production of Massenet’s masterpiece, which has its first performance on 2 April 2017. The title role is sung by no less than the Peruvian star tenor Juan Diego Flórez.