Salzburg Festival 2019: Mystical Summer Ahead

Wait no more: Salzburg Summer Festival 2019 is starting on July 20. It feels like a yesterday that I participated for the first time last year. Now as a experienced (!) attendee, I can say it is not overrated. It was a lovely festival with great stagings.

Last year I attended Salome and Die Zauberflöte, and both productions made me see the pieces in a different way. For the reviews of last year you can click here for Salome; here for Die Zauberflöte. 

This year again exciting venues waiting for us. I have again two performances to attend (hopefully time will come for me to attend all the shows: free and first category tickets; waiting for sponsors I guess :) ). Since in reality I am doing this in between my busy work schedule and with my own afford, two performance is ideal. But before that: let's look into the festival programme. 

2019's theme is mythts from antiquity. The opening piece will be Mozart's Idomeneo. The other new productions from the festival will be Offenbach's Orphée aux Enfers, George Enescu’s Oedipe, and Cherubini’s Médée. The other opera venues are Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra, Pascal Dusapin's Medeamaterial and Handel's Alcina. Salome, last year's great success will be repeated with Asmik Grigorian. The concert versions of Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur and Verdi's Luisa Miller will amaze the audience with their amazing casts. 
Anna Netrebko will be starring in Adriana Lecouvreur; Placido Domingo will be in Luisa Miller; Cecilia Bartoni will be in Alcina. For me, the most exciting venue will be Idomeneo; I wonder Peter Sellar's retake of the piece with Russell Thomas in the title role. 

There's also lots of concerts you don't want to miss. Riccardo Muti will conduct Verdi's Requem and Daniel Barenboim will conduct Mahler's Kindertotenlieder and Symphony No.5. Vienna Philharmonic will again mesmerize all music lovers in the city of Mozart. 

Festival preperad a wonderful theme and program for us, I believe it will be again wonderful to see all the classical music lovers in one place with their music love in these hot summer days and with their wrinkled clothes that shows their admiration :) I will be among the crowd, come and find me if you dare :) 
Let's meet again in the review of the Idomeneo and Adriana Levcouvreur!

Ece Demirel

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