After a scandalous world première, no other opera has ever been performed as often as “Carmen” by Georges Bizet (1818-1875). The enigmatic heroine is still today generally regarded as the woman of every man’s dreams. From the start she makes clear what her attitude to love is in her habañera: unlimited freedom for her feelings, and also absolute freedom from all moral inhibition. This is finally her downfall: obsessed by his desire to possess her, Don José cannot cope with her. Jealousy drives him to kill her.

In his staging, director Carlos Wagner plunges his public into the gloomy Spain described by the pictorial world of Goya. He depicts her longing for freedom, and the tragedy of how her strong-willed nature has the young corporal Don José completely at a loss, in emphatically poetic tableaux in which dream-worlds merge into nightmarish reality.


“Deutsche Oper am Rhein shows an interpretation which explodes over-constricting realism without straying into interpretative speculation”.
Christoph Zimmermann, Orpheus

“High tension in this ‘Carmen’ is generated to only by the expressive staging, but also by the musical and dramatic individual performances”.
Lars Wallerang, Westdeutsche Zeitung

 
***
Georges Bizet

CARMEN
Opéra comique in four acts
Libretto by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy after Prosper Mérimée

 
In French with German surtitles
 

Musikalische Leitung Christoph Altstaedt
Inszenierung Carlos Wagner
Bühne Rifail Ajdarpasic
Kostüme Patrick Dutertre
Licht Fabrice Kebour
Chorleitung Gerhard Michalski
Choreographie Ana Garcia
 
Don José Sergej Khomov
Escamillo James Bobby
Remendado Johannes Preißinger
Dancaïro Attila Fodre
Zuniga Torben Jürgens
Moralès Bogdan Baciu
Carmen Ezgi Kutlu
Micaëla Elisabeth Selle
Frasquita Luiza Fatyol
Mercédès Sarah Ferede
Tänzerin Michèle Lama, Anna Roura-Maldonado, Sara Blasco Gutiérrez, Carmen Mar Canas Salvador
Tänzer Joeri Burger, Alexeider Abad Gonzales, Michael Schuldt, Jonas Tilly, Jonas Tilly
Leitung Kinderchor Justine Wanat
Chor Chor der Deutschen Oper am Rhein
Kinderchor Düsseldorfer Mädchenchor
Orchester Düsseldorfer Symphoniker