Glyndebourne Festival launches on 18 May, with a varied programme of operas taking place throughout summer until August. A production of Berlioz’s La damnation de Faust (1846) will open the festival.
This represents the opera’s debut at Glyndebourne; it will be directed by Richard Jones. Glyndebourne’s Music Director Robin Ticciati, a champion of Berlioz, will conduct the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
He commented: “As music director it is a huge privilege to be conducting La damnation de Faust in 2019, the centenary year of Berlioz’s death. It is a mercurial combination of Berlioz’s novel harmonies, endless melodic invention, visceral response to literature and technicolour orchestration that helped me to fall in love with his music.”
The opera requires a huge orchestra and concert and so is often performed as a concert work. This is the first fully staged new production to take place in the UK since 2011, when filmmaker Terry Gilliam made his opera debut directing a production at London’s English National Opera.
Other highlights include the festival’s first-ever staging of Cendrillon (Cinderella, Massenet, 1899) with Fiona Shaw’s thoughtful contemporary updating of the rags-to-riches fairytale. Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute, Mozart, 1791) returns to Glyndebourne for the first time in more than a decade in a new production by the renowned directing/design duo Barbe & Doucet that promises a fresh and playful take on opera’s troublesome gender politics.
As part of the 2019 festival, Glyndebourne and Trafalgar Releasing will be bringing live broadcasts to cinemas around the country. Live performances of Cendrillon and Die Zauberflöte will be streamed into cinemas, while a recording of Il barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville, Rossini, 1816) from the 2016 festival will also be broadcast.
Visit Glyndebourne’s website for more information and to book tickets.
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Cendrillon will be performed at the festival for the first time (Richard Hubert Smith).