'Werther': a romantic drama that is back at Liceu after 25 years
The opera is based on the novel by Goethe with a score by Jules Massenet
Werther has played a grand total of 51 times at the Wagner-loving Gran Teatre del Liceu, though the last time this story of impossible love with music by Jules Massenet played there was on 19 July 1992. But that lamentable lapse will become history on 15 January, when Werther and his beloved Charlotte will appear from behind the curtain again. The opera, with a libretto by Édouard Blau, Paul Milliet and Georges Hartmann is based on the 1774 novel, The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Werther is a four-act dramatic opera that premiered at the Vienna Opera in 1892 and played for the first time at Barcelona’s Liceu only seven years later. This staging of the opera features Willy Decker as stage director. It has been acclaimed at various opera venues around the world. Alain Altinoglu is acting this time around as musical director, while the cast includes the tenors Piotr Beczala and Josep Bros who takes turns in the role of Werther, while mezzo-sopranos Anna Caterina Antonacci and Nora Gubisch do the same in the role of Charlotte.