Schwetzingen Festival

The Schwetzingen Festival (German: Schwetzinger Festspiele, now Schwetzinger SWR Festspiele) is an early summer festival of opera and other classical music presented each year from May to early June in Schwetzingen, Germany.

Schwetzingen Festival, during a concert intermission.

In 1952, the broadcaster Süddeutscher Rundfunk founded the festival in the Schwetzingen area. It is located in a beautiful 250-year-old palace and park, Schwetzingen Castle, near the famous city of Heidelberg. The main venue is the historic Schlosstheater Schwetzingen. Nowadays, the successor organization is the Südwestrundfunk (SWR) and it organises many international concerts and music theatre events every year.

List of major premieres and rediscoveries

One of the festival's characteristics is the world premiere of a new opera, as well as at least one rediscovered opera from former centuries, performed on period instruments.

Year World premieres Early rarities
2000 Karl-Wieland Kurz: gute miene böses spiel Giovanni Legrenzi: La divisione del mondo
2001 Manuel Hidalgo: Bacon 1561–1992 Joseph Haydn: L'anima del filosofo
2002 Salvatore Sciarrino: Macbeth Georg Benda: Il buon marito
2003 Frederik Zeller: Irma Vep Ignaz Holzbauer: Il figlio delle selve
2004 Adriana Hölszky: Der gute Gott von Manhattan Giovanni Paisiello: Il re Teodoro in Venezia
2005 Frederik Zeller: Zaubern Alessandro Scarlatti: Telemaco
2006 Salvatore Sciarrino: Kälte (Da gelo a gelo) Joseph Martin Kraus: Proserpina in German
2007 Bernhard Lang: Der Alte vom Berge Giovanni Legrenzi: Il Giustino
2008 Adriana Hölszky: Hybris/Niobe Agostino Steffani: Niobe, regina di Tebe
2009 Wolfgang Rihm: Proserpina George Frideric Handel: Ezio
2010 Michael Jarrell: Le Père André Grétry: Andromaque
2011 Georg Friedrich Haas: Bluthaus Christoph Willibald Gluck: Telemaco
2012 Enno Poppe: IQ. Testbatterie[1] Anton Schweitzer: Rosamunde[2]
2013 Georg Friedrich Haas: Thomas Tommaso Traetta: Ifigenia in Tauride
2014 Bernhard Lang: Reigen Johann Adolph Hasse: Leucippo 1747
2015 Hèctor Parra: Wilde Leonardo Vinci: Didone abbandonata, (pasticcio by Handel)
2016 Georg Friedrich Haas: Koma Francesco Cavalli: Veremonda, l’amazzone di aragona 1652
2017 Annette Schlünz: Tre Volti – Drei Blicke auf Liebe und Krieg Nicola Porpora: Mitridate

Concerts

Concerts have featured well-known artists such as Gidon Kremer, Jorge Bolet and Cecilia Bartoli, as well as young artists at the start of their careers. Singers of the caliber of Barbara Hendricks, Fritz Wunderlich and Teresa Berganza have performed at the festival as beginners and have all gone on to major careers.

See also

References
  1. Klangforum Wien, calendar entry for 27 April 2012. Retrieved 30 September 2011.
  2. "Rosamunde". swr.online (in German). 17 May 2012. Retrieved 23 July 2023.
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