Rodolphe Briand

La Vie parisienne (Parisian life) is an opéra bouffe, or operetta, composed by Jacques Offenbach in 1866, with a libretto by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy. This work was Offenbach's first full-length piece to portray contemporary Parisian life, unlike his earlier period pieces and mythological subjects. It became one of Offenbach's most popular operettas.

This adaptation of three tales by E.T.A. Hoffmann, with a sprinkling of Goethe’s Faust, portrays the German poet as both narrator and hero recounting his love affairs with Olympia, Antonia and Giuletta. Robert Carsen’s spectacular production highlights the melancholy genius of a man marked by life, with a coherence and dramatic sense remarkable for a work that leaves numerous questions unanswered. Under the baton of Philippe Jordan, Stéphanie d’Oustrac, Ermonela Jaho, Kate Aldrich, Yann Beuron and Ramón Vargas and Stefano Secco in the main role, interpret the legendary airs of this work whose brilliant mystery will continue to dazzle opera houses for countless years to come.

In this new "Marriage of Figaro", Jérémie Rhorer revisits this composer and US film director James Gray makes his first foray into opera. This opera is recorded for broadcast by Louise Narboni.

“Manon is like any person who, strolling down the street one day, glances up at a second-story window and catches a glimpse of a different life,” explains Vincent Huguet about his staging of Massenet’s Manon, “a life that she suddenly desires ardently … and will do anything to have.” In his update of Prévost’s famous novel, Huguet demonstrates, with empathy and acuity, that Manon’s tale could really be anyone’s.

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Time stands still whenever Giuditta starts to sing. Regarded as a bird of paradise, many a man has tried to enclose her in a golden cage and trap her in chains of diamonds disguised as necklaces. To no avail: the beautiful Giuditta is as protective of her freedom as her secrets. No one truly knows from whence she came, not the bird-catcher who one day found her on the shore and married her no questions asked, or the handsome Captain Octavio with whom she ran away to North Africa…

Live performance from Teatro alla Scala, 7 December 2009 .

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