Cast

Rodolphe Bruneau-Boulmier

Biography will be published shortly.

Performances

• Die Illusionen des William Mallory

N.N.

Biography will be published shortly.

Performances

• Hänsel und Gretel (Hansel and Gretel)
• Ariadne auf Naxos
• La Fanciulla del West (The Girl of the West)
• Parsifal
• Pique Dame
• Die Illusionen des William Mallory
• Salome

Inge Kloepfer

Inge Kloepfer is an award-winning journalist, non-fiction writer and screenwriter. She began her career as a journalist at the "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung", for which she still writes today. Her breakthrough as a highly acclaimed non-fiction author came with the bestseller "Friede Springer - die Biografie", followed by numerous other publications. Together with Kent Nagano, she wrote the books "Erwarten Sie Wunder! Expect the Unexpected" and "10 Lessons of my Life - Was wirklich zählt". Together with Omer Meir Wellber, she wrote "Die Angst, das Risiko und die Liebe - Momente mit Mozart", a book that deals with the collaboration between Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and the librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte, using the three operas "Don Giovanni", "Die Hochzeit des Figaro" and "Cosí van tutte" as examples. Most recently, her biography of the highly gifted pianist, composer and mathematician Kit Armstrong "Metamorphosen eines Wunderkinds" was published. Her debut as a novelist followed in 2023 with "The Doubts of Homer Spiegelman". She has now published her first libretto with "Die Illusionen des William Mallory".

Performances

• Die Illusionen des William Mallory

photo: Daniel Biskup

Director

Georges Delnon

Georges Delnon was born in 1958 in Zurich. He studied history and art history at the Universities of Bern and Friborg as well as composition and music theory at the Bern Conservatory. Positions as assistant director, including works with Jean-Pierre Ponnelle, Götz Friedrich and Giorgio Strehler, completed his training.

This was followed by the first opera and theater productions such as "Carmen" and "Fledermaus" at the Frankfurt Opera, "Dido" in Toulouse, "Rape of Lucretia" in Dusseldorf and Basel, "Fräulein Julie" in Essen, "La Griselda" (Vivaldi) in Geneva, "Junge Lord" (Henze), "Maria Stuart" and "Ezio" for the Händel Festival in Karlsruhe, "Schwarze Spinne" (Sutermeister), "Das Lachen der Schafe " (Demierre) and "König für einen Tag" (Grünauer) for the Lucerne Festival in Switzerland. In 1996, he took over his first artistic directon at the Theater of the City of Koblenz and became co-founder of the Koblenz fortress games. From 1999-2006, he became Artistic Director of the Staatstheater Mainz, where numerous works were created. Among other things, the reopening of the Great House was broadcasted live on 3Sat in 2001 with the staging of the opera "Saul" by G. F. Händel.

Other works as director during this period include "Il figlio delle selve" by Ignaz Holzbauer for the Schwetzinger Festspiele and the Féstival Radio France Montpellier. In addition, Georges Delnon appeared as an actor in the movie “HEIMAT 3” by Edgar Reitz.

In 2004, he directed the world premiere of Mark André, "22.13", for the Munich Biennale, the Festival d'Automne à Paris and the Opéra National de Paris. In 2005 and 2006, he staged the world premiere "Zaubern" by Frederik Zeller and the baroque opera "Proserpina" by Joseph Martin Kraus for the Schwetzinger Festspiele.

From 2006 to 2015, Georges Delnon has been director of the Theatre Basel, Switzerland's largest three-party house. Under his leadership, the theatre became Opera House of the Year in the Opernwelt Critics Survey twice, in 2009 and 2010. In 2010, he directed Giuseppe Verdi's TV production "Aida am Rhein", which was broadcasted live on Swiss television and on 3Sat.

In 2012, he directed the world premiere of Alfred Zimmerlin's music theatre "Das Licht" for the Lucerne Festival and in 2013 "Anschlag", also for the Lucerne Festival and märz musik Berlin.

From 2009 to 2016, Georges Delnon was Artistic Director of the Music Theatre of the Schwetzinger SWR Festival. The two world premieres "Proserpina" in 2009 and "Koma" in 2016 were honored in the critics' poll of the opera world as "premiere of the year".

Since 2015, he is the Artistic Director of the Hamburg State Opera and the Hamburg Philharmonic State Orchestra. Under his leadership, Alban Berg's "Lulu" is voted "Performance of the Year" in the critics' survey of the opera world in 2017, and director Christoph Marthaler receives the Faust Prize for this production. In the summer of 2018, Georges Delnon's Hamburg staging of the Zauberflöte for young people "Erzittre, feiger Bösewicht", was screened in Shanghai. In 2019 he staged the chamber opera "THERÈSE", which was premiered at the Salzburg Easter Festival and celebrated its German premiere in the Recital Hall of the Elbphilharmonie at the Hamburg International Music Festival.

Performances

• Die Kreide im Mund des Wolfs
• Die Illusionen des William Mallory

photo: Peter Schnetz

Stage and costume designer

Marie-Thérèse Jossen

Birthplace:
Luzern, Switzerland

Studies:
Dressmaking

Important productions:
“THERÈSE” (Osterfestspiele Salzburg UA / Elbphilharmonie, directed by: Georges Delnon), “Saul” (Staatstheater Mainz, directed by: Georges Delnon); “Don Giovanni” (Staatstheater Mainz, directed by: Georges Delnon); “...22,13...” (Co-production of the Munich Biennale with the Staatstheater Mainz and the Festival d'automne à Paris); “Der Alte vom Berge” (Koproduktion des Theater Basel mit den Schwetzinger SWR Festspielen, 2007); seit 2004 Kostümbilder zu Martin Schläpfers Balletten “Frogs and Crows”, “Ritirata notturna”, “Diabelli-Variationen”, “Reformationssymphonie”, “3” und “Pezzi und Tänze”; “Unleashing the Wolf” (Ballett am Rhein), “La Traviata” (Staatstheater Mainz, directed by: Vera Nemirova); “Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg” (Theater Erfurt/Deutsches Nationaltheater Weimar, directed by: Vera Nemirova), et al.

Career stages:
Costumes management at Luzerner Theater; Guest engagements at the theaters in Saarbrücken, Hannover, Wuppertal, Dortmund, Mainz, Theater in der Josefstadt Wien, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Festspielhaus Baden Baden, several Swiss stages (Opera and drama productions)

Cooperations:
Georges Delnon, Martin Schläpfer, Vera Nemirova, et al.

Performances

• Die Illusionen des William Mallory

photo: Philipp Göbel

Dramaturgy

Ralf Waldschmidt

Birthplace:
Hanau on the Main, Germany

Studies:
Studied German, English and Theatre Studies at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt on the Main; received his doctorate (Dr. phil.) with a thesis on Richard Wagner's “Parsifal” (1987)

Relation to the Hamburg State Opera
leading Dramaturge at the Hamburg State Opera since the 2021/22 season

Career stages:
Intendant of the Osnabrück Theatre (2011–2021), opera director at the Augsburg Theatre (2007–2011), chief dramaturge and deputy to the general director at the Bremen Theatre, dramaturge at the Berlin State Opera Unter den Linden (1999–2003), Engagements as head dramaturge and member of the artistic management at the Staatstheater Darmstadt and the Freiburg Theatre, dramaturge at the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus and the Nationaltheater Mannheim (1987–1992), assistant director and dramaturge at the Saarländisches Staatstheater Saarbrücken and the Frankfurt Opera

Cooperations:
Ruth Berghaus, Jürgen Flimm, Nicolas Brieger, Bruno Klimek, Harry Kupfer, Urs Troller, Rosamund Gilmore, Urs Schaub, Peter Mussbach, Percy Adlon, Alexander May, Barrie Kosky, Yona Kim, Reinhild Hoffmann und Dirigenten wie Friedemann Layer, Marc Albrecht, Michael Gielen, Daniel Barenboim, Philippe Jordan, Lawrence Renes, Stefan Klingele, Sebastian Weigle, Dirk Kaftan, Andreas Hotz, Daniel Inbal, et al.

Performances

• Die Illusionen des William Mallory

Mitglieder des Philharmonischen Staatsorchesters Hamburg

The Philharmonic State Orchestra is Hamburg’s largest and oldest orchestra, looking back on many years of musical history. When the “Philharmonic Orchestra” and the “Orchestra of the Hamburg Municipal Theatre” merged in 1934, two tradition-steeped orchestras combined. Philharmonic concerts have been performed in Hamburg since 1828, artists such as Clara Schumann, Franz Liszt and Johannes Brahms being regular guests of the Philharmonic Society. The history of the opera company goes back even further: Hamburg has been home to musical theatre since 1678, even if a regular opera or theatre orchestra was only formed later. To this day, the Philharmonic State Orchestra has embodied the sound of the Hansa City, a concert and opera orchestra in one.

During its long history, the orchestra encountered great artist personalities. Apart from composers of the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, such as Telemann, Tchaikovsky, Strauss, Mahler, Prokofiev and Stravinsky, since the 20th century chief conductors such as Karl Muck, Joseph Keilberth, Eugen Jochum, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Horst Stein, Aldo Ceccato, Christoph von Dohnányi, Gerd Albrecht, Ingo Metzmacher and Simone Young have shaped the orchestra’s sound. Renowned conductors of the pre-war era such as Otto Klemperer, Wilhelm Furtwängler, Bruno Walter, Karl Böhm and Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt gave brilliant performances, as did outstanding conductors of our times: suffice it to mention Christian Thielemann, Semyon Bychkov, Kirill Petrenko, Sir Neville Marriner, Valery Gergiev and Sir Roger Norrington.

Starting with the 2015/2016 season, Kent Nagano has taken on the position of Hamburg’s General Music Director and Chief Conductor of the Philharmonic State Orchestra and the Hamburg State Opera. In his first season Kent Nagano initiated a new project, the Philharmonic Academy, focusing on experimentation and chamber music. In 2016 Nagano and the Philharmonic undertook a successful three-week concert tour in South America, a tour of Spain followed in 2019. Since 2017 Kent Nagano and the Philharmonic State Orchestra have continued the traditional Philharmonic Concerts at the new Elbphilharmonie, for which they commissioned Jörg Widmann to compose the oratorio ARCHE, which was given its world premiere during the hall’s opening festivities. The concert recording has been released at ECM.

The Philharmonic State Orchestra offers approximately 35 concerts per season and performs more than 240 performances per year at the Hamburg State Opera and the Hamburg Ballet John Neumeier, making it Hamburg’s busiest orchestra. The stylistic bandwidth covered by the 140 musicians, ranging from historically informed performance practice to contemporary works and including concert, opera and ballet repertoire, is unique throughout Germany. Chamber Music has a long tradition at the Philharmonic State Orchestra: what began in 1929 with a concert series for chamber orchestra has been continued since 1968 by a series of chamber music only.

In 2008 Simone Young and the Philharmonic State Orchestra won the Brahms Award of the Schleswig-Holstein Brahms Society. The orchestra has recorded the complete Ring by Wagner as well as the complete symphonies of Johannes Brahms and Anton Bruckner – the latter in the rarely-performed original versions – as well as works by Mahler, Hindemith and Berg, and has released DVDs of opera and ballet productions by Hosokawa, Offenbach, Reimann, Auerbach, J.S. Bach, Puccini, Poulenc and Weber.

The members of the Philharmonic State Orchestra feel equally beholden to Hamburg’s musical tradition and responsible for the city’s artistic future. Since 1978 the musicians have been participating in education programmes in Hamburg’s schools. Today, the orchestra maintains a broad education programme, including school and kindergarten visits, patronage for music projects, introductory events for children and family concerts. The orchestra’s own academy prepares young musicians for their professional careers. The Philharmonic’s musicians thereby make an equally enjoyable and valuable contribution to tomorrow’s music education in the music metropolis of Hamburg.

Performances

• 3rd Academy Concert
• Dollhouse
• PhiSch - das Staatsorchester hautnah...
• Die Illusionen des William Mallory
• Die verlorene Melodie

photo: Foto: Felix Broede