Easter Sunday in the small greek village of Lycovrissi. The priest Grigoris assigns the roles for the Passion play: Mary Magdalene will be played by the village whore Katerina, Judas by the blacksmith Panait and Christ by the young shepherd Manolios. As the preparations are underway, a group of refugees, whose village has been destroyed by the Turks, arrives and begs for asylum. While the priest Grigoris and most of the village’s inhabitants reject their pleas, Manolios and Katerina have pity and show them a shelter in the mountains. As Manolios, who identifies more and more with his role as Jesus, appeals to the village to show more neighbourly love, the situation threatens to escalate…
“Love thy neighbour as thyself.” What do such commandments count for in a world in which everyone is his own neighbour? With the “Greek Passion”, Czech composer Bohuslav Martinů (1890-1959) created a mixture of opera and oratorio in which great choruses and intimate moments of chamber music, psalmodic passages and folkloric elements collide. A deeply distressing work which questions the humanitarian values of a society and shows how fear and insecurity can lead to hatred and rejection.
This gripping chorus opera is staged by Tibor Torell, who recently enjoyed success in Coburg with his stagings of “La Cenerentola” and “Neues vom Tage”. His designer Nicola Reichert’s work includes costumes for “Der Ring des Nibelungen” at Leipzig Opera as well as stage and costume design for Britten’s “Billy Budd” at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein.
- Musical Director
- Roland Kluttig
- Chorus Director
- Mikko Sidoroff
- Children’s Chorus Director
- Daniela Pfaff-Lapins
- Director
- Tibor Torell
- Designer
- Nicola Reichert
- Dramaturg
- Dorothee Harpain
- Grigoris
- Michael Lion
- Captain
- Marvin Zobel
- Panait
- Dirk Mestmacher
- Lenio
- Dimitra Kotidou
- Manolios
- Milen Bozhkov
- Yannakos
- Peter Aisher
- Fotis
- Bartosz Araszkiewicz
- Katerina
- Olga Shurshina
Chorus of Landestheater Coburg
Extra Chorus of Landestheater Coburg
Children’s Chorus of Landestheater Coburg
Philharmonic Orchester of Landestheater Coburg