7, 10, 13, 18, 21 July

OPERA IN THREE ACTS
LIBRETTO BY THE COMPOSER BASED ON THE DRAMA WOYZECK (1836) BY GEORG BÜCHNER
FIRST PERFORMED ON 14 DECEMBER 1925 AT THE STAATSOPER UNTER DEN LINDEN, BERLIN

NEW PRODUCTION FESTIVAL D’AIX-EN-PROVENCE

— WITH THE SUPPORT OF MADAME ALINE FORIEL-DESTEZET, GRANDE MÉCÈNE D'EXCEPTION DES 75 ANS DU FESTIVAL D'AIX-EN-PROVENCE
The audience is struck by an act of continuity in violence, continuity in division and continuity in vision: with all that lies behind the dream, as if the pit of the mind had opened up.

Pierre Jean Jouve and Michel Fano, Wozzeck d’Alban Berg (1964)
Wozzeck is a typical example of the poor humanity of modern times: a brave soldier, scapegoat of a whole social system, who kills his mistress out of jealousy and then commits suicide. The Romantic playwright Büchner painted this vivid portrait in the early days of industrialisation: a relentless movement of objectification of beings that culminates in the mass grave of the First World War – of which Berg's opera is, in its own way, the posttraumatic echo, as much as it prophesies the world to come. For his third time at the Festival, Simon McBurney captures Wozzeck’s last minute, the moment when he drowns, and makes it a spectacular externalisation of his tormented psyche, as well as a grotesque recollection of his obsessions. Sir Simon Rattle will conduct the London Symphony Orchestra and a first-rate cast; Christian Gerhaher brings all his Liedersänger skills
in a subtle and heart-rending incarnation of the title role as a myth of our time.

Conductor
Sir Simon Rattle

Stage director
Simon McBurney

Set design
Miriam Buether

Costume design
Christina Cunningham

Lighting design
Paul Anderson

Choreography, collaboration to the stage direction
Leah Hausman

Video
Will Duke

Dramaturgy
Gerard McBurney

Collaboration to the stage direction
Sasha Milavic-Davies
 

Wozzeck
Christian Gerhaher

Marie
Malin Byström

Tambourmajor
Thomas Blondelle

Doktor
Brindley Sherratt

Hauptmann, Der Narr
Peter Hoare

Andres
Robert Lewis

Margret
Héloïse Mas*

Erster Handwerksbursche
Matthieu Toulouse

Zweiter Handwerksbursche
Tomasz Kumięga*
 

Choir
Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir

Children's choir
Maîtrise des Bouches-du-Rhône

Orchestra
London Symphony Orchestra
 
*Former artists of the Académie