Act I

Act II

Act III

Couv_Eliogabalo_780x9064

Libretto

Violent, terrifying and fascinating, Caligula, Nero and Elagabalus led lives so short, ambivalent and cruel that they inspired numerous writers. “Anarchy, to the extent to which Elagabalus pushes it, is genuine poetry”, wrote Antonin Artaud, exalting a man’s battle against conventions and order. Cavalli’s last-known opera, dating from 1667, focuses on the perverse young emperor who neglected affairs of state in favour of sensual pleasures. Systematically overturning accepted morals, Elagabalus dresses men as women, and names women to the Senate, favours sinning servants and humiliates generals. Baroque and carnivalesque, Eliogabalo is not, however, an opera that advocates a return to order. Leonardo García Alarcón, a finder of baroque gems, and Thomas Jolly are careful not to transform Eliogabalo into a sublime icon who would abase virtue. On the contrary, the conductor and young director, who are presenting their first production for the Paris Opera, accept the character’s contradictions and ambiguities. Orchestre Cappella Mediterranea Chœur de Chambre de Namur Coproduction avec de Nationale Opera, Amsterdam Coproduction Opéra national de Paris, CLC Productions with the participation of France TélévisionsWith the support of the Orange Foundation, patron of the Paris Opera's audiovisual broadcasts and with the assistance of the Centre national du cinéma et de l'image animée. Director: Julien Condemine &amp; Roberto Maria Grassi © Opéra national de Paris - CLC Productions – 2016Visuel ©Agathe Poupeney / OnP&nbsp;&nbsp;

Eliogabalo: Emperor of Rome Alessandro: Eliogabalo’s cousin and heir Gemmira: Giuliano’s sister, engaged to Alessandro but coveted by Eliogabalo Giuliano: Prefect of the Praetorian Guard, in love with Eritea Eritea: A young woman dishonoured by Eliogabalo and in love with Giuliano Zotico: A confidant and favourite of Eliogabalo Lenia: Eliogabalo’s nurse Nerbulone: Coach driver, Lenia’s fiancé Atilia Macrina: A young woman in love with Alessandro Tiferne: A gladiator

2016-17-ELIOG162

Eliogabalo

Violent, terrifying and fascinating, Caligula, Nero and Elagabalus led lives so short, ambivalent and cruel that they inspired numerous writers. “Anarchy, to the extent to which Elagabalus pushes it, is genuine poetry”, wrote Antonin Artaud, exalting

Francesco Cavalli

Born on February 14, 1602, Francesco Cavalli (real name Pier Francesco Caletti) was the most popular Italian composer of his lifetime. With a beautiful voice, he joined the choir of the duomo of Crema, where his father was maestro di cappella. Noticed by a Venetian nobleman, Federico Cavalli (whose patronymic he would later take), the young Francesco entered the choir of the Basilica of San Marco in 1616, where he rubbed shoulders with Monteverdi, and was then hired as organist at the Basilica of Santi Giovanni e Paolo. He made many friendships in the circle of Venetian society. In 1630 he married Maria Sosmeno, a wealthy Venetian widow. He acquired sufficient financial independence to be able to detach himself from his duties as a church musician and embarked on the adventure of opera, which was then booming in the City of the Doges. His first opera, Le Nozze di Teti e di Peleo, was premiered in 1639 at the Teatro San Cassiano, the first public theater in Venice. In his second opera, Gli Amori di Apollo e di Dafne, Cavalli laid the groundwork for what was to become the Venetian aesthetic as opposed to the court opera then in force. In La Didone (1641), mythology gave way to history for the first time. The protagonists are no longer deities but humans. La Didone was the first opera performed in Naples for a paying audience. The death of Claudio Monteverdi in 1643 made Cavalli the first Venetian composer. He composed thirty-three operas, eleven of which were written in collaboration with the same librettist, Giovanni Faustini, among which La Calisto (1651) remains one of the models of Venetian opera. Giasone (1649) was the most performed opera of its time in the West. In 1660, Cavalli went to France at the invitation of Cardinal Mazarin for the festivities of the marriage of Louis XIV and the Spanish infanta Maria Theresa. Ercole amante is created in the new hall of the Tuileries, built for the occasion. Louis XIV demanded that ballets composed by Lully, to which the king and queen danced in person, be inserted between acts. Cavalli's music was not successful. Cavalli returned to Venice, where he composed his last six operas, on historical Roman subjects, including Eliogabalo (1667), the last work whose score has survived, which was never performed during his lifetime. He died on January 14, 1676.

Fagioli.Franco

Groves

Nadine Sierra was born in Florida and studied at the Mannes College of Music in New York before joining the Adler Fellowship Program at the San Francisco Opera where she made her debut in the company in 2011. In 2007 and 2009 she was the youngest prize-winner at the Marilyn Horne Foundation Vocal Competition and the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. She has won numerous competitions in the United States, including the Richard Tucker Award in 2017 and the Beverly Sills Artist Award in 2018. Soon thereafter, her career took on an international dimension. She made debut appearances at Milan’s La Scala and the New York Metropolitan Opera in Rigoletto (Gilda), the Paris Opera in Don Giovanni (Zerlina) and the Berlin Staatsoper as Amor in Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice under the direction of Daniel Barenboim. She has appeared as Flavia (Eliogabalo), Pamina (Die Zauberflöte) and Gilda at the Paris Opera, and Zerlina and Ilia (Idomeneo) at the New York Metropolitan Opera. She also makes regular guest appearances at the San Francisco Opera (La Bohème, Le Nozze di Figaro, Die Zauberflöte, Lucia di Lammermoor). During the 2017-2018 season, she made debuts in the roles of Susanna (Le Nozze di Figaro) at the Metropolitan Opera, Nanetta (Falstaff) at the Berlin Staatsoper, Norina (Don Pasquale) at the Paris Opera and she sang the title role in Lucia di Lammermoor at La Fenice in Venice. The following season, she performed the role of Manon at the Bordeaux Opera and appeared in a new production of Rigoletto at the Berlin Staatsoper. She also sang the role of Maria in a concert version of West Side Story conducted by Antonio Pappano at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. During the 2019-2020 season, she made her role debut as Violetta (La Traviata) at the Teatro Real in Madrid and sang the roles of Juliette (Roméo et Juliette) in San Francisco and Bordeaux, Susanna at the Metropolitan Opera, Sophie (Der Rosenkavalier) and Nannetta at the Berlin Staatsoper and Lucia at the Royal Opera House in London.

Sierra.Nadine.9.(c)

schneiderphotography_0294

Elin-Rombo

Newlin.Matthew

Leonardo García Alarcón was born in La Plata (Argentina) in 1976 and moved to Europe in 1997. In addition to his theoretical training at the Centre de Musique Ancienne in Geneva, he studied the harpsichord under Christiane Jaccottet at the conservatory there. A conductor, harpsichordist and teacher of the “maestro al cembalo” class at the Haute École de Musique in Geneva, Leonardo García Alarcón has won acclaim from audiences and critics of the specialized press for his rediscovery of previously unknown works and for his innovative interpretations of familiar repertoire works. In 2005, he created his own ensemble, the Cappella Mediterranea. Since 2010, he has also been artistic director and principal conductor of the Chœur de Chambre de Namur. Between 2010 and 2013 he was artist in residence at the Cultural Meeting Centre in Ambronay. The restaging of Cavalli’s opera Elena at the 2013 Aix Festival earned him invitations to perform as a conductor and a harpsichordist in theatres around the world including the Montpellier, Lyon, Nantes, Rennes and Lille Operas, the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Monte Carlo Opera, the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, London’s Wigmore Hall, the Teatro Massimo in Palermo, and New York’s Carnegie Hall. In 2015, he created the Millenium Orchestra in Belgium. He opened the Paris Opera’s 2016-2017 season with Eliogabalo, and then conducted Il Giasone in Geneva, Erismena at the 2017 Aix Festival, the Sasha Walz production of Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo at the Berlin Staatsoper in November 2018, Antonio Draghi’s El Prometeo and Francesco Sacrati’s La Finta Pazza at the Dijon Opera and, more recently, Charpentier’s Médée at the Grand Théâtre in Geneva. His discography has earned unanimous critical acclaim. In September 2016, Leonardo García Alarcón recorded I 7 Peccati Capitali on Alpha Classic, an imaginative programme based on the airs of Monteverdi. The work was highly acclaimed in the press and earned a nomination for Best Recording at the 2017 Victoires de la Musique. In 2018, he recorded works by Lully, Jacques Arcadelt and Joan Manuel Serrat. In February 2019, Alpha Classics released Il Giasone on DVD. Leonardo García Alarcón is currently an artist in residence at the Dijon Opera.

Thomas Jolly was born in Rouen in 1982. In 2003, after a period of professional training at ACTEA and a degree in Theatre Studies at the University of Caen, he integrated the École Supérieure d’Art Dramatique at the National Theatre of Brittany in Rennes, director Stanislas Nordey, where he worked with Jean-François Sivadier, Claude Régy, Bruno Meyssat and Marie Vayssière. In 2005, he took part in Splendid’s by Genet, directed by Cédric Gourmeton and in 2006, under the direction of Stanislas Nordey, he performed in Peanuts by Fausto Paravidino.At the end of his training, he founded the company Piccola Familia with some of the actors with whom he had shared his apprenticeship years. In 2007 he directed Marivaux’s Arlequin poli par l’amour (revived in 2011 with a new cast), Toâ by Sacha Guitry in 2009 (Prix du public, Festival Impatience, Théâtre de l’Odéon in Paris) and Piscine (pas d’eau) by Mark Ravenhill, which was presented at the Festival “Mettre en Scène” in 2011 in Rennes.He has also received commissions from Trident – Scène Nationale de Cherbourg-Octeville where he directed Une nuit chez les Ravalet, a promenade production with Piccola Familia, Pontormo in 2008 and Musica Poeta in 2011 and two musical productions with the baroque ensemble Les Cyclopes.Since 2010, he has been working on William Shakespeare’s Henry VI, a theatrical saga lasting eighteen hours, the first two episodes of which were premiered at the Trident in 2012. The third episode saw the light of day at the National Theatre of Brittany in Rennes, at the Festival Mettre en Scène in 2013. That same year, Thomas Jolly directed Box Office, a play by the young author, Damien Gabriac. In July 2014, he directed the fourth and final episode of Henry VI. The production was performed in its entirety at the 68th edition of the Avignon Festival. In 2015 he undertook the direction of Richard III, bringing his Shakespearean tetralogy to a conclusion and received the Jean-Jacques Gautier – SACD prize and the Molière for the direction of a play for state theatre for his work on Henry VI.Alongside his work as a director, Thomas Jolly teaches the advanced students at the École Supérieure d’Art Dramatique of the National Theatre of Brittany in Rennes. He also conducts workshops at the Conservatoire in Rouen and at ACTEA in Caen. In October 2014, he directed a Russian version of Arlequin poli par l’amour by Marivaux with the actors of the Gogol Centre in Moscow.Since 1st January 2014, Thomas Jolly has been an associated artist of the National Theatre of Britanny in Rennes. In July 2016, he will become an associated artist of the National Theatre of Strasbourg. He is making his debut at the Paris Opera this season with a production of Eliogabalo by Francesco Cavalli.

Gareth Pugh was born in Sunderland, England. He joined the Fashion Design section of Central Saint Martins, from which he graduated in 2003. In 2005, he created the house Gareth Pugh and presented his first collection during the London Fashion Week. In 2006, he walked in the official London Fashion Week. His avant-garde creations are very successful in the fashion world. He distinguishes himself by proposing atypical models, playing with shapes, volumes and materials, such as leather, vinyl or latex. In 2008, he received the ANDAM Prize (National Association for the Development of Fashion Arts) and presented his first Parisian collection. The following year, he created his first menswear collection. His shows were on the Parisian calendar for six years, before a return in 2015 to London Fashion Week where he celebrated the tenth anniversary of his label. Vogue Runway magazine called his Spring/Summer 2016 collection "perhaps his best collection ever." Over the past decade, Gareth Pugh has worked with some of the most innovative and popular artists of our time (such as Beyonce, Lady Gaga and Rihanna) and with renowned institutions around the world, such as for the Manus x Machina exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Arts in New York. He also works for theater and dance: most notably, he created the costumes for Wayne McGregor's ballet Aleas Sands at the Palais Garnier in December 2015. He is represented by Karla Otto and CXA New York.

Antoine Travert is a young lighting designer of twenty-nine years old. Fascinated since childhood by the technique of the show, he started in the world of music and then as an apprentice technician at the Brèche in Cherbourg. Very quickly, the new technologies of light attract him, he then decides to specialize. In 2010, he meets Thomas Jolly and the Piccola Familia on the creation of Piscine (no water). Their collaboration continues on the creation of Henry VI, in 2011, where Antoine becomes a lighting assistant. In 2012, he joined the tour Et vous tu m'aimes of the group Brigitte as a lighting assistant. The collaboration with Thomas Jolly continues: Antoine Travert makes the creation of light as well as the tour of the second part of Henry VI in 2013 and 2014, mixing traditional and slave light. He created Richard III in 2015, an innovative show in which light and its automatic machines play a role as much of scenography as of actor. In June 2016, still with Thomas Jolly, he accompanies the students of the stage management section of the Ecole du Théâtre National de Strasbourg for the creation of the exit show Le Radeau de la Méduse. In parallel to his creative activities, he continues to host different companies in theaters and festivals.

After beginning her career as an actress, Corinne Meyniel turned to an academic career to become a teacher-researcher in theatre studies. She teaches dramaturgy, performance analysis and theater history at the university, and has participated in the publication of two anthologies of little-known texts from the 16th and 17th centuries. She keeps a regular contact with the stage by accompanying various amateur practices during ten years. Her knowledge of French baroque theater led her to Brussels where she worked as a dramaturge on the "bloody tragedy" of the students of the RITS (Erasmushogeschool Brussel) and then collaborated with the ensemble Les Dames Galantes (directed by Chloé Sévère) on baroque programs. She met Thomas Jolly in 2014 to discuss biblical references and theological issues in Shakespeare's Henry VI. In 2016, she accompanies the collective Nos années sauvages for its performative event Insurrection. In November, the creation in Caen of Stravinsky's Rake's Progress will mark her first collaboration with David Bobée.

Thibaut Lenaerts won his first prizes for singing under the guidance of Greta DeReyghere at the Royal Conservatory in Liège and Thierry Migliorini at the Royal Conservatory in Mons. He has sung as a soloist under the direction of numerous conductors including William Christie (Les Arts Florissants), Hervé Niquet (Le Concert Spirituel), Guy Van Waas, Leonardo García Alarcón, Louis Langrée, Jean Tubéry, Patrick Davin, Marc Minkowski, Frider Bernius, and Philippe Herreweghe… Highly esteemed as a concert performer and a recitalist, he has appeared at numerous opera venues, from La Monnaie in Brussels to theatres in Liège, Rennes, Avignon, Reims, and Versailles under the baton of Christophe Rousset among others. Thibaut Lenaerts is an active member of the Namur Chamber Choir both as a singer and as an assistant for the ensemble. Since 2014 he has been the assistant of conductor Leonardo García Alarcón. He prepares the choir for productions conducted by Guy Van Waas, Christophe Rousset, and Jean-Claude Malgoire among others… He has performed all over the world with Les Arts Florissants from Rio de Janeiro, to New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Singapore, Moscow, Tokyo, Hong-Kong, and Istanbul…He has worked with directors like Robert Carsen, Frédéric Dussenne, Luc Bondy, José Montalvo, and Deborah Warner. Thibaut Lenaerts also teaches at the Royal Conservatories in Brussels and Liège. He has recorded some fifty CDs and leads his own vocal and instrumental ensemble: Le Petit Sablon.

OperaEliogabalo

Creatives

Cast

Extras

Libretto

Les Indes galantes

Don Giovanni

Les Troyens

Simon Boccanegra

Samson et Dalila

OperaEliogabalo

Show more

The characters

The acts

Creatives

Libretto

Les Indes galantes

Don Giovanni

Les Troyens

Simon Boccanegra

Samson et Dalila