Die Frau Ohne Schatten

The jealously protected daughter of the powerful ghost count Keikobad was once hunted and caught by the emperor of the Southern islands in form of a gazelle and since then has been his wife, the empress. To prevent the emperor turning into stone, she has to throw a shadow, which means in her world that she has to gain the ability to give birth to a child. Therefore, she wants to buy a shadow from a childless and unhappy dyer in the human's world. But she recognizes that she can only buy her fortune by bringing misfortune to the dyers' couple and decides to forego it.

Still during World War I, Richard Strauss and his congenial partner Hugo von Hofmannsthal created this fabulous, fantastic opera full of symbols and metaphors, that they both regard as their main work. Without any doubt, the The Woman without a Shadow, shimmering between distance from reality and psychoanalytic artistic enthusiasm, is one of the most enigmatic but also fascinating works of the whole opera repertoire. With all conceivable sounds, seemingly glimmering in all shades of color, Strauss once more spreads the whole range of late romantic orchestra art in his challenging, opulent opus and negotiates the intimate in a bombastically big format. Claus Guth's diverse and impressive directing work, previously shown at Scala in Milan and the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, points out the dark undertones of the opera and in the same time evokes the struggle of the empress, caught between two worlds.

Introduction and preface 45 minutes before curtain time.

The opera will be shown in German language with English surtitles.