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Giuseppe Verdi in May

Les Vêpres Siciliennes

Giuseppe Verdi (1813 – 1901)

Information on the piece

Opera in five acts
Libretto by Eugène Scribe and Charles Duveyrier
First performed on 13 June 1855 at the Théâtre Impérial de L'Opéra Paris as part of the Paris World's Fair
Premiere at the Deutsche Oper Berlin on 20 March 2022

3 hrs 45 mins / 1 interval

In French language with German and English surtitles

Pre-performance lecture (in German): 45 minutes prior to each performance

recommended from 16 years
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Kindly supported by the Förderkreis der Deutschen Oper Berlin e. V.

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About the performance

About the work
For his first commission for the Paris Opéra Verdi demanded a libretto that was “immense, passionate and original”. What he eventually got from star author Eugène Scribe was a text whose political edginess rivalled the grand opéras of Giacomo Meyerbeer, with whom Scribe had collaborated on LES HUGUENOTS and LE PROPHETE. Like these two works, LES VÊPRES SICILIENNES explored a subject that was not only historical but also highly topical. Parallels could easily be drawn between the “Sicilian Vespers” uprising in 1282 against the island’s French occupiers and the most conspicuous of France’s mid-19th-century expansionist ventures, the conquest and colonialization of Algeria, which began in 1830 and was dogged by an ongoing series of brutally quelled revolts.

About the production
This link likewise serves as the slant for the current production by French director Olivier Py, who has already shown his sensibility for the grand-opéra approach to political material in his staging of Meyerbeer’s LE PROPHETE at the Deutsche Oper Berlin: the French occupation of Algeria, which extended from Verdi’s period to the 1950s, provides the setting for Py’s version of the story, which, after LA TRAVIATA and RIGOLETTO, was another example of Verdi expanding the focus of his musical dramas. His regard is no longer fixed only on the fate of individual characters; in LES VÊPRES SICILIENNES he is interested in the fortunes and woes of entire nations. Undiluted hatred, a desire for reconciliation and the tension between these two extremes are what drive the actions of the main protagonists and the interactions of occupiers with the subjugated. LES VÊPRES SICILIENNES has long been overshadowed by Verdi’s other great operas, but here the Deutsche Oper Berlin presents the original 1855 French version of the work, not the Italian adaptation that became the standard.

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An Italian in Paris
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07
DEC

Adventsverlosung: Das 7. Fensterchen

Today we are giving away an unforgettable family Christmas classic: Engelbert Humperdinck's HÄNSEL UND GRETEL on 26 December 2024 at 2:00 p.m. for four people. If you would like to take part in the draw for four tickets, please send an e-mail to advent@deutscheoperberlin.de today with the subject line ‘The 7th window’.

Although HÄNSEL UND GRETEL is actually set in spring – it's strawberry season –, this opera is a Christmas classic for young and old alike. And so Humperdinck's ‘children's Christmas pageant’ is once again scheduled this December in Andreas Homoki's imaginative production: are they naughty or just playful, the two children Hansel and Gretel? In any case, the broom they are supposed to bind breaks, the stocking that is already half-knitted dissolves into squiggly yarn. And then the milk pot falls to the floor. So the mother sends the two children into the forest to collect strawberries. Unexpectedly, they escape the confines and poverty of the broom-maker's house and find themselves in an enchanted forest that transforms everything instantly: their clothes are suddenly much more colourful, birds sing sweetly in the iridescent light, strawberries and flowers grow in abundance, lovable clowns rock them to gentle dreams... If only the witch weren't there.

For over 100 years, Humperdinck's HÄNSEL UND GRETEL has been one of the most popular operas for the whole family. Andreas Homoki tells the story in a child-friendly and straightforward way. Together with his set and costume designer Wolfgang Gussmann, he counteracts the opulence of the music with a lightness and poetic imagery that reaches its magical climax in the night scenes in the forest.



Closing date: 7 December 2024. The winners will be informed by email on 9 December 2024. The tickets will be sent to you as Ticketdirect. No right of appeal to the courts.