Artistic Director in Erl

Jonas Kaufmann will take over as artistic director of the Erl Festival in Austria; he will succeed Bernd Loebe in September 2024. As Hans Peter Haselsteiner, President of the Tiroler Festspiele Erl (photo), announced at a press conference on 2 June in Vienna, Kaufmann prevailed over 42 other applicants.

With his vision, enthusiasm, personality and his stage experience, he convinced the appointment committee, which also included Lotte de Beer (director of the Vienna Volksoper) and Bogdan Roscic (director of the Vienna State Opera), and was chosen by them as “primus et unicus” for the appointment.

Jonas Kaufmann will usher in a new era for the Erl Festival, explained Andrea Mayer, State Secretary for the Arts and Culture. To have him “as the new artistic director of the Erl Festival is an extraordinary honour and reflects the festival’s aspiration: international charisma and at the same time honoring the culture and history in the region.”

As Kaufmann said at the press conference, his new task is by no means “a first step towards the singer’s early retirement. I don’t feel that I should retire, and I don’t want to. I’m a person who likes to work a lot, so now I have another hobbyhorse to work on without having to be on stage every day.”

To watch the recording of the press conference, click here.

Nächster Artikel:

The Munich production of “Chenier” on DVD and Blu-ray

“This fast-paced narrative with its realistic dialogue between characters and its emotional arch almost gives one the impression that Giordano would have liked to make a feature film, yet did not yet have the necessary technology at his disposal. In fact, at the same time as this opera was being written and premiered, film was also being born." With these words, director Philipp Stölzl also described an essential aspect of his production of Giordano's Andrea Chenier at the Bavarian State Opera: the stage is presented as a "split screen" that simultaneously shows the "upper and lower" social classes during the French Revolution. This December 2017 revival of the production, conducted by Marco Armiliato, was recorded and recently released on DVD and Blu-ray on the Bavarian State Opera’s record label. "Jonas Kaufmann, Anja Harteros and George Petean shine in an imaginative yet faithful production by Philipp Stölzl. The then 78-year-old Brian Large proves once again that he is the best of all classical music videomakers." (Merker online)

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