Agrippina

Agrippina wears many masks, ranging from moralising reflections on the conscience to uninhibited cries of triumph. Director Mariame Clément sees the world of the soap opera as the perfect contemporary response to Händel’s allegories. Here, too, passion, jealousy and thirst for power go hand in hand. Machiavellism, unbridled lust, borderline behaviour, unscrupulous intrigues and hypocrisy, blind ambition and the danger of thoughtless power; It’s all revealed in full glory and opulent detail. A dream setting in which the reprise of this successful production becomes a volatile cocktail of originality and humour.

Händel masterfully combines the forms and styles that he picked up in both the German opera of his day and in the innovative Italian music scene. The score already contains all the elements that would later flourish in his great Italian operas for the London stage. It's for good reason that Agrippina is regarded as one of Händel’s first masterpieces. Stefano Montanari, who, as a virtuoso baroque violinist and opera director knows a thing or two about Italian baroque music, is the ideal musical director for this production. The title role will once again be performed by the Swedish mezzo-soprano and acclaimed Agrippina: Ann Hallenberg.