Henry Purcell’s monumental Baroque opera Dido & Aeneas transports us to a breathtaking world of opera and dance, in which Sasha Waltz reinterprets the story through her distinctive choreographic language.
Inspired by the poignant verses of Virgil’s Aeneid, this intense tragedy tells the love story of Dido, Queen of Carthage, and Aeneas, the Trojan hero, who fall victim to a conspiracy unleashed by dark forces.
Title from the archive of the Teatro Real, available exclusively to subscribers in Spain.
Tragic opera in three acts and a prologue
Music by Henry Purcell (1659–1695)
Libretto by Nahum Tate, based on his play Brutus of Alba, or the Enchanted Lovers (1678) and Book IV of The Aeneid (1st century BC) by Publius Vergilius
First known performance at the Josias Priest Girls’ Boarding School in Chelsea in December 1689
Premiered in a concert version at the Teatro Real on 18 November 2013
A production by Sasha Waltz & Guests and the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, in co-production with the Berlin Staatsoper, the Grand Théâtre de la Ville de Luxembourg and the Opéra national de Montpellier
Artistic team
Conductor I Christopher Moulds
Coreography I Sasha Waltz
Stage I Thomas Schenk
Stage I Sasha Waltz
Costumes I Christine Birkle
Lightining I Thilo Reuther
Cast
Dido I Marie-Claude Chappuis
Belinda I Aphrodite Patoulidou
Aeneas I Nikolay Borchev
The sorceress I Yannis François
Second woman I Luciana Mancini
Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin
Vocalconsort Berlin
