Marc-Antoine Charpentier : Médée N/A

Jean-Philippe Rameau: Samson (Festival d'Aix-en-Provence) 2024

When, in 1733, Voltaire, the most brilliant mind of his day, collaborates with Rameau, its greatest composer, in undertaking an ambitious reform of operatic practice, the result is the biblical opera Samson. But the libretto is condemned and the score lost – possibly reworked here and there in later compositions. Claus Guth and Raphaël Pichon, haunted by this interesting project that had turned into one of the most intriguing failures in operatic history, have tried, not to recreate the letter, but to revive the spirit: to marry a strong, noble libretto with the most eloquent music.

Médée 2024 ( 6)

Possibly mythology’s most unfathomable character: Medea, the sorceress, betrayed by her husband Jason, takes revenge by offering the latter’s lover a poisoned dress and then killing her own children. Such a destiny, so often portrayed in the arts, could not but be embodied at the Opera. In 1693, Marc-Antoine Charpentier premiered his only “tragédie lyrique”, based on a libretto by Thomas Corneille, at the Académie royale de Musique – forerunner of the Paris Opera – in the presence of Louis XIV. Three centuries after its creation, this baroque score of great orchestral wealth returns for the first time to the stage of the Paris Opera, under the baton of William Christie. Renowned for his exceptionally articulate interpretations, director David McVicar transposes the action to the Second World War, thus reinforcing the heroine’s tragic character.