Moshe Leiser and Patrice Caurier

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Moshe Leiser (born 1956 in Antwerp ) and Patrice Caurier (born 1954 in Paris ) are two opera directors who have worked exclusively in pairs since 1982. You stage at opera houses in Western Europe and Austria.

life and work

Giulio Cesare in Egitto with Cecilia Bartoli , Salzburg Festival 2012

The collaboration between the two directors began in 1983 at the Opéra de Lyon with an opera - A Midsummer Night's Dream - the creation of which is also thanks to a couple of men: Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears jointly adapted Shakespeare's text for the theater and wrote the libretto, while Britten composed and conducted , Pears first sang Flute and Thisbe, then Lysander. Since this premiere, Leiser and Caurier have lived and worked together without interruption. Jasper Rees wrote of this more than 30-year collaboration that they were "the equivalent of Gilbert and George in opera".

For a long time the Belgian-French directing duo worked exclusively in the French provinces and French-speaking Switzerland, occasionally also at the Spoleto Festival USA in South Carolina and at the Welsh National Opera . In 1999 the two directed A Midsummer Night's Dream at Opera North in Leeds. In 2001 he was invited to the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in London, where Leiser / Caurier are still active. The then Zurich artistic director Alexander Pereira finally engaged the directing duo in 2008 for the first time in German-speaking countries. In Zurich, the two directors worked closely and productively with Cecilia Bartoli . In 2012 Bartoli and Pereira - both now in management positions in Salzburg - brought the two directors to the Salzburg Whitsun Festival . A few months later the Bregenz Festival followed , in 2013 the Theater an der Wien and then the Vienna State Opera .

Leiser / Caurier work continuously with the same equipment team - the set designer Christian Fenouillat , the costume designer Agostino Cavalca and the lighting designer Christophe Forey . Several of her productions have been released on DVD.

After a premiere at La Scala in Milan in 2015, Leiser insulted the conductor Riccardo Chailly with swear words , which the international press saw as an indication of the gap between scenic and musical interpretation.

style

Leiser / Caurier try to use contemporary facial expressions and gestures to bring even distant subjects closer to the audience. On the one hand, one must distinguish between their implementations and comic operas that show no fear of slapstick and effect , are precisely worked and even transform banal plots into coherent narratives. On the other hand, they condense tragic developments, for example through the relocation of the Ring des Nibelungen to the period of post-war Germany - or the Norma to the Mussolini era.

Directorial work (selection)

Il Barbieri di Siviglia 5926-Peralta.jpg
Il Barbieri di Siviglia 6328-Peralta.jpg
Il barbiere di Siviglia 6981-Michelides.jpg
Directed by Moshe Leiser / Patrice Caurier

U = first performance, SE = Swiss first performance. The opera houses were ranked chronologically according to the first directorial work at the respective house. The dates of the premieres have not yet been fully verified, in some cases the productions may have been seen in previous years.

Awards

Quotes

“People think that the director is responsible for what you see and the conductor is responsible for what you hear. I think this is nonsense. In reality, it is the director who enables the music to exist and the conductor who enables the game. If we don't achieve that, there will be no opera. "

- Leiser / Caurier : About the opera

“In the process of social normalization, we lose youth and the opportunity to be totally absorbed by poetry. That's why the Magic Flute is so great, because it tells it - with a fairy tale that touches so many aspects of life. "

- Moshe Leiser : "I don't believe in sacred cows"

“I spread fear and terror. Patrice will then clean it up again. "

- Moshe Leiser : About the distribution of tasks

Translations of the English quotes by Christian Michelides.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jasper Rees: theartsdesk Q&A: Opera Directors Patrice Caurier and Moshe Leiser , April 3, 2010
  2. ↑ Dirk Schümer : What “stronzo di merda” means , in: Die Welt , December 12, 2015, p. 25 # Stephanie Kirchgaessner: Opera season's opening night at La Scala ends in disharmony , in: The Guardian , December 9, 2015 # Paolo Zonca: Scala, giù il sipario con insulto. Duello Chailly-regista , in: La Repubblica , 9 December 2015
  3. ↑ Jasper Rees: theartsdesk Q&A: Opera Directors Patrice Caurier and Moshe Leiser , April 3, 2010
  4. ^ Kurier (Vienna) : Moshe Leiser: "I don't believe in holy cows" , November 16, 2013
  5. ↑ Jasper Rees: theartsdesk Q&A: Opera Directors Patrice Caurier and Moshe Leiser , April 3, 2010