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Are we ever honest enough to be unaffected by lies? This is the question asked by Henrik Ibsen’s drama Ghosts (Gengangere). Oswald Alving returns from a bohemian existence in Paris to small-town Norway. Encountering people who do not communicate, Oswald responds by becoming ironic and distant. He gradually learns more of the secrets that weigh on his family, as well as those inside himself. His mother, Mrs Alving, welcomes her much-missed son home – and slowly understands what, or whom, he has brought home with him. «Ghosts is a psychological thriller in which the characters learn more and more about their own stories,» says director Marit Moum Aune. «It’s about how the unsaid can grow to become insuperable. Immense courage is required to make peace with one’s illusions.» Together with the young, critically acclaimed choreographer Cina Espejord, she retells Ibsen’s play as a ballet. The pair feel the story is suited to dance because both its inner and outer brutality can be pitted against the power of dance. Ibsen’s Ghosts is an evocative production in a modern dance style. Nils Petter Molvær has composed new music, which he performs on-stage together with Jan Bang.

“El Publico” is Lorca’s most difficult and mysterious play, one of the great classics of modern Spanish theatre. Lorca wrote it in Cuba, just after his trip to New York, at a time of intense experimentation in art and life. Homosexuality is addressed openly in “El Publico,” and the play is a cry of defiance against bourgeois hypocrisy and a plea for sexual and artistic freedom. It has been transformed into an opera thanks to Gerard Mortier. He commissioned the composer Mauricio Sotelo to create an opera for the Spanish repertoire of the 21st century. This production from Teatro Real de Madrid is the world premiere recording of El Publico as an opera. Pablo-Heras Casado conducts the Klangforum Wien and the Chorus of the Teatro Real.

The starting point and destination of Heinz Spoerli's new ballet is the "Magnificat" by Johann Sebastian Bach. From the beginning of the "Allemande mouvement" of the "Partita in A minor for solo flute" through the joy of living of "Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 in G major", this is the the question of faith, which sparked Heinz Spoerli's interest in this piece. Heinz Spoerli intensifies the wealth of expanded emotions here, by inserting the two arias from the cantatas "Wo soll ich fliehen hin" ("Where shall I flee") and "Ich habe genug" ("I have enough"). This is an important aspect for Heinz Spoerli in his discourse with the text of the "Magnificat", in which his deep respect for all religions, or rather every faith, for him is not about the worship of a certain creator-figure, but more about the conditions and prerequisites of this for the expression of a profound devoutness, which also involves rejection, exlusion, uncertainty and separation. Images coming out of the silence and returning back to it, which Heinz Spoerli would like his audience to take with them, images which create individual stories and references. The Orchestra La Scintilla is conducted by Marc Minkoswki.

Choreography: Heinz Spoerli
Set design: Peter Schmidt
Format: NTSC 16:9 HD
Region Code: 0 (All Region)
Recorded: live from the Zurich Opera House February, 2012

When the European youth chooses War above Love, Cupid decides to seek out new followers on other continents. The opera thus recounts the way people love, hate, envy or trust overseas, all the while asking its western audience a burning question: how do we love right? In "Dreams of Babel", a documentary about the dance prodigy Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui released on DVD by Bel Air Classiques in 2010, the choreographer explained how shifting identities, multiculturalism, and his own plural heritage as the son of an immigrant, had shaped his dramaturgy and artistic inspiration. Thus, to take on the stage direction for "Les Indes Galantes", whose multiple plots take place in a fantasized exotic « elsewhere » supposed to mirror the European society, meant for Cherkaoui bringing the tension between identity and alterity to a whole new level. And the choreographer pushes his reflection much farther than mere baroque specular aesthetics: his "Indes Galante"s raise the sensible issues of population movements, fragmented and ever-changing territories and borders, but also the refugee crisis that has shaken Europe to its very core… For this new production at the Prinzregenten Theater, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui brought his own dance ensemble, the Eastman company, as well as a brilliant vocal cast, among which Anna Prohaska, Francois Lis or Lisette Oropesa. Ivor Bolton conducts a Münchner Festspielorchester at the top of its game.

Bringing together again, for the first time since their premiere, Tchaikovsky's opera Iolanta and ballet The Nutcracker, was the audacious challenge that Russian stage director Dmitri Tcherniakov accepted for the Palais Garnier in Paris in March 2016 : a revolutionary production, which was to become one of the key events of the Paris Opera season. With great intelligence, Tcherniakov renews the dialogue between the two masterpieces, and reveals their common origins. He thus reminds us that both Iolanta and The Nutcracker are first and foremost initiatory journeys, in which the heroes experience love and loss, fortune and misfortune. In doing so, Dmitri Tcherniakov, with the collaboration of contemporary choreographers Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, Edouard Lock and Arthur Pita, goes as far as to completely disregard the magical extravaganzas that Marius Petipa associated to The Nutcracker, and radically turns the dream into a nightmare dominated by despair and loneliness. To insure the continuity and a sense of dramatic consistency between the opera and the ballet, Tcherniakov skillfully modulates the space provided by the Palais Garnier. A solution that also enables him to question the very nature of both theater and illusion, as well as their specular relationship with the reality they try to make us forget. Bulgarian soprano Sonya Yoncheva delivers a flamboyant interpretation of the blind princess Iolanta, and shares the stage with Polish tenor Arnold Rutkowski and Ukrainian bass Alexander Tsymbalyuk. The internationally renowned French conductor Alain Altinoglu joins forces with the Paris Opera Orchestra and Chorus, while the Paris Opera Ballet, among which Marion Barbeau- a radiant Marie - and the Etoiles Stéphane Bullion and Alice Renavand, revives the most popular ballet of all time.

Bel Air Classiques presents Wagner’s mystic masterpiece “Parsifal” in a brilliant staging by Dmitri Tcherniakov in the spectacular Staatsoper Berlin. Wagner’s last completed opera, it was begun in April of 1857 but wasn’t completed until twenty-five years later. It is loosely based on the 13th century epic poem Parzival by Wolfran von Eschenbach, in which an Arthurian knight quests for the Holy Grail. Wagner referred to this work as a “festival play for the consecration of the stage,” rather than an opera. This international cast of outstanding singers lights up the stage, and Daniel Barenboim’s interpretation of the score shimmers in the spotlight.

To celebrate the Verdi bicentennial, La Fura dels Baus opened the "Centanario Festival 2013" of the Arena di Verona with a new production of “Aida”. The most popular opera of Verona Festival, Aida is the only one performed every year, in front of 17,000 spectators. Using their experience in leading large-scale shows, La Fura dels Baus created an Aida for the XXIst century. The young, talented conductor Omer Meir Wellber led the Orchestra, Coro, Corpo di Ballo e Tecnici dell’Arena di Verona.

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Georges Bizet’s “Carmen”, one of the world’s most beloved operas and a staple of the operatic since its premiere a mere three months before the composer’s death in June, 1875 was staged at the world-famous Arena di Verona in June, 2014 in an opulent production directed by the flamboyant Franco Zeffirelli and filmed in High Definition. The cast is an international lineup of excellent singers: Russian mezzo-soprano Ekaterina Semenchuk (“This gorgeous mezzo-soprano is gifted with an amazing voice… captivating timbre and good pronunciation… - Operaclick), soprano Irina Lungu ([her] voice has the brightness you associate with most coloraturas, but also bloom and warmth, which are more unusual qualities…” – New York Times), tenor Carlo Ventre (“I regard Ventre as one of the finest spinto tenors singing today.” – Opera Warhorses) and baritone Carlos Álvarez (… ample, virile voice…” – Opera News). Conductor Henrik Nánási leads the Arena di Verona Orchestra and Chorus.

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The “Nutcracker” remains one of the most popular ballets ever with Tchaikovsky’s luscious score annotating the fantasy and enchantment of the tale. Vasily Medvedev and Yuri Burlaka, two Russian choreographers have developed a version for the Staatsballett Berlin which is based on the historic stage designs and choreography from the original of 1892. This glittering production was designed as a reproduction of the great ballet féerie, an older form of French theater which includes opulent scenery and mechanically worked stage effects. With the Orchestra of the Deutsch Opera, Berlin conducted by Robert Reimer.

Iana Salenko (Clara & the Sugar Plum Fairy), Marian Walter (Nutcracker & Prince Coqueluche), Michael Banzhaf (Drosselmayer), Arshak Ghalumyan (Mouse King), Elena Iseki (Young Clara) & Linus Schmidt (Fritz)
Soloists & corps de ballet of the Staatsballett Berlin, Students of the Ballettschule Berlin & Children’s Choir & Orchestra of the Deutsche Oper Berlin, Robert Reimer.

• Vladimir Fedoseyev conducts the Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra in performances of Tchaikovsky and Miaskovsky. • Alexander Khyazev is the featured performer in the Miaskovsky's Cello Concerto. • Mr. Fedoseyev has been the orchestra's principle conductor and artistic director since 1974, and its music director since 2006. • Filmed live in concert at the Musikverein, Vienna, Austria, in March 2009.

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This new Pelléas et Mélisande from the Opernhaus Zürich should be remembered as one of Dmitri Tcherniakov's most innovative production. Forget about the fountains, the caverns, the forest, the castles and the towers : here, the density of Maurice Maeterlinck’s and Claude Debussy’s symbolism becomes the starting point of an analytical journey into the human mind : it is now the psychoanalyst, ‘‘doctor’’ Golaud, who has to uncover the secrets of Melisande, an unfortunate and traumatized creature he brings home, and whose silence and puzzling attitude eventually bring him on the verge of insanity. But this production is also the occasion for a reunion between Dmitri Tcherniakov and French conductor Alain Altinoglu, after the tremendous success of the Tchaikovsky diptych Iolanta / The Nutcracker - arguably one of the most successful titles of the Bel Air Classiques catalogue. Their artistic complicity is intact : the precise, analytical but also nuanced and poetic baton of Altinoglu proves to be the best possible response to Tcherniakov’s subtle exploration of the human psychology. Corinne Winters, as Melisande, Jacques Imbrailo, as Pelléas, and especially Kyle Ketelsen, as Golaud, embody with an incandescent realism these characters plagued by a form of evil and violence that we will never quite understand.

TCHAIKOVSKY The Nutcracker • Pavel Klinichev, cond; Nina Kaptsova ( Marie ); Artem Ovcharenko ( Nutcracker Prince ); Denis Savin ( Drosselmeyer ); et al.; Bolshoi Ballet; Bolshoi Th O & Children’s Ch • BELAIR BAC 073 (DVD: 103:00); BAC 473 (Blu-ray: 103:00) Live: Moscow 12/2010


"The Bolshoi Ballet is celebrating the 85th birthday of choreographer Yuri Grigorovich, a subject of veneration in his homeland even though his talent outside Russia has always been questioned. In addition to such original works as Spartacus and Ivan the Terrible , Grigorovich has also attacked several 19th-century classics with limited success, of which his Nutcracker is an example. It is difficult to know how much of Petipa and Ivanov’s choreography survives, as few versions are comparable, though one might assume that Balanchine comes close in many respects as do the versions that descend from Sergeyev’s notation. For some reason each of the character dances in the second act here is given to a couple, rather than varying between soloist, couple, or trio or larger group. The final pas de deux is—as usual in Soviet versions—disfigured by the use of a male corps that separates the dancers while hoisting them aloft for the music’s climax so that they are separated rather than joined in communion.


Within this framework, Nina Kaptsova and Artem Ovcharenko stand out for their enthusiasm and brilliance, while Denis Savin as Drosselmeyer is given far more dance movement than in other versions of the ballet. Pavel Klinichev and the Bolshoi Orchestra are entirely at home in this music, glowing throughout."

FANFARE: Joel Kasow

'The Passion according to Mark-A Passion after Auschwitz,' premiered in April 2017. The project was commissioned to French composer Michaël Levinas by the Swiss association "Musique pour un temps présent", as part of the events commemorating the 500th anniversary of Luther's reform. This original oratorio is not only a reinterpretation or a mere revisitation of the Passion, it painfully faces, indeed, the irreconcilable nature of the Passion and the Holocaust. What is the object of this Passion after Auschwitz, which revolves around what can link two musical traditions, two religions that have been separated by barbarism. Which music, which tradition, which language can the composer use in order to express this double silence, both historical and theological, both human and divine? "After the Holocaust, is it possible to compose without crying and trembling?", Michaël Levinas asks. It is not about anger or compassion. Because of the subtle polyphonies written for the chorus, the voices and the orchestra, and also because of the way the different languages - Old French, Yiddish, Aramaic, German - create meaning out of one another, both the structure and the musical language of this Passion are incredibly intricate. But they are so for a reason: by putting side by side western musical traditions and the tragic component of modern history, Levinas manages to "shake," during the artistic process, the future of the Holy Language and of the Gospel after Auschwitz. What separates therefore the Gospel of Mark from the Jewish prayer for the dead (Kaddish) or from the El male Rahamim, or from the two poems by Paul Celan ending the work, is not so much a question of representation, but more accurately it is a way to make the tragedy resound, without any artifice and without any safety net.

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Three years after the creation of Médée, Krzysztof Warlikowski and Christophe Rousset were together again at La Monnaie for the revival of one memorable production whose staging reinforces the violence, tension and cruelty of this tragedy.

Whilst this work by Cherubini is considered part of the 'opéra-comique' genre, it is only due to the presence of spoken dialogue, which has been modernised here in the Polish stage director's interpretation.

Written in 1797, Cherubini's faithful version of Euripides' ancient tragedy is one of the most savage and powerful works of the opera repertoire, relating the cruel vengeance of a wounded woman for whom infanticide seems to be the only solution to her humiliation in love. As a continuation of Gluck's music, Cherubini's work is of boundless emotion, at once a refined, terrifying and desperate portent of a tragic outcome.

The cast : Nadja Michael as Médée, Kurt Streit as Jason, Christianne Stotijn as Néris Médée’s slave, Vincent Le Texier as King Créon and Hendrickje Van Kerckhove as Dircé Créon’s daughter. Christophe Rousset is conducted Les Talens Lyriques and the Chœurs de la Monnaie.

Director: Stéphane Metge
Length: 138 min - Image: Color, 16/9, NTSC
Audio: PCM Stereo, Dolby Digital 5.1
Subtitles: French / English / German / Dutch

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Founded in Tel-Aviv in 1964, the Batsheva Dance Company has been headed since 1990 by Ohad Naharin: an incredible dancer with musical training, who has a true passion for movement. Through his “Gaga” technique, a choreographic vocabulary that explores the sensations and the availability of the bodies, he made his mark on the dance world and offered the company its finest hours. In 2015, Tomer Heymann’s documentary “Mr. Gaga” paid tribute to the Naharin phenomenon, its influence on the contemporary dance scene and in pop culture. This diptych aims to broaden the Batsheva videography by, as a showcase of Naharin’s aesthetics and demanding technique, featuring two of the most emblematic works in the company’s current repertoire, both filmed in Paris: Naharin’s Virus and Last Work. A collective creation, Naharin’s Virus is, in a way, a dialogue between Naharin’s choreographic style and the Batsheva dancers’. Its starting point is the text Publikumsbeschimpfung (Offending the Audience) by the Austrian playwright Peter Handke. An aesthetic manifesto, it is also a political piece: it is worth noting, for instance, that it features traditional music written by a Palestinian composer… A carefully negotiated balance between frenzy and meditation, a frail and unstable whole saturated with an enigmatic opacity and symbolism, Last Work is also a politically committed, ethically-charged piece reflecting on war, peace, oppression and coercion. While dance is stretched up to its limits, Naharin’s choreographic gesture calls for a new outlook on our contemporary world, its violence, its possibilities, its future.

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Bringing together again, for the first time since their premiere, Tchaikovsky’s opera Iolanta and ballet The Nutcracker, was the audacious challenge that Russian stage director Dmitri Tcherniakov accepted for the Palais Garnier in Paris in March 2016 : a revolutionary production, which was to become one of the key events of the Paris Opera season. With great intelligence, Tcherniakov renews the dialogue between the two masterpieces, and reveals their common origins. He thus reminds us that both Iolanta and The Nutcracker are first and foremost initiatory journeys, in which the heroes experience love and loss, fortune and misfortune. In doing so, Dmitri Tcherniakov, with the collaboration of contemporary choreographers Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, Edouard Lock and Arthur Pita, goes as far as to completely disregard the magical extravaganzas that Marius Petipa associated to The Nutcracker, and radically turns the dream into a nightmare dominated by despair and loneliness. To insure the continuity and a sense of dramatic consistency between the opera and the ballet, Tcherniakov skillfully modulates the space provided by the Palais Garnier. A solution that also enables him to question the very nature of both theater and illusion, as well as their specular relationship with the reality they try to make us forget. Bulgarian soprano Sonya Yoncheva delivers a flamboyant interpretation of the blind princess Iolanta, and shares the stage with Polish tenor Arnold Rutkowski and Ukrainian bass Alexander Tsymbalyuk. The internationally renowned French conductor Alain Altinoglu joins forces with the Paris Opera Orchestra and Chorus, while the Paris Opera Ballet, among which Marion Barbeau- a radiant Marie - and the Etoiles Stéphane Bullion and Alice Renavand, revives the most popular ballet of all time.