Don Giovanni, K. 527

Composer: Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus

Librettist/Text Author: Ponte, Lorenzo da

Conductor: Billy, Bertrand de

Orchestra: Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra

Chorus: Vienna State Opera Chorus

Chorus Master: Lang, Thomas

Commendatore: Kocherga, Anatoly

Don Giovanni: Maltman, Christopher

Don Ottavio: Polenzani, Matthew

Donna Anna: Dasch, Annette

Donna Elvira: Roschmann, Dorothea

Leporello: Schrott, Erwin

Masetto: Esposito, Alex

Zerlina: Siurina, Ekaterina

Set Designer: Schmidt, Christian

Costume Designer: Schmidt, Christian

Lighting Designer: Winter, Olaf

Choreographer: Sigl, Ramses

Stage Director: Guth, Claus

Television Director: Large, Brian

---

Date of Production: 2008

Festival: Salzburg Festival

Venue: Haus fur Mozart, Salzburg

Playing Time: 03:00:00

Catalogue Number: A04001510

Libretto

Don Giovanni, K. 527 DE

Synopsis

Don Giovanni, K. 527

---

Wild animals live in the woods. Robbers hide there. Mystery is at home there. And, when the woods are on the stage of Salzburg's Haus fur Mozart, a notorious ladies' man and his unsavory accomplice can also find shelter there. For here, in the dense forest planted by director Claus Guth, is the home of the rugged macho Don Giovanni, who, assisted by Leporello, lures the ladies with the heady scent of danger. In Guth's almost cinematic Salzburg Festival production, every character in Mozart's most realistic opera seems to carry a back-story of thwarted love and frustration. Everyone appears to be seeking either salvation or damnation in the woods – a compelling concept that removes the opera from its traditional pseudo-Seville squares and palaces.

Don Giovanni is played by Christopher Maltman. Donna Anna, played by Annette Dasch, Donna Elvira by Dorothea Roschmann and Zerlina by Ekaterina Siurina. With a physique as striking as his full-bodied baritone voice, Maltman embodies Don Giovanni as an almost reluctant seducer, a man fated to bring misery to women and, ultimately, to himself. Next to Maltman, it is Uruguayan bass-baritone Erwin Schrott who rivets the audience in this production: "Schrott's Leporello is an event in his own right, the event of the Salzburg Don Giovanni" (Die Welt). This Leporello is no bumbling sidekick or nobleman's scapegoat, but his master's worthy companion on the road to perdition. Among the women, Roschmann gives a heart-stopping account of rage, passion and love in her arias. And Don Ottavio, played by Matthew Polenzani has nothing in common with the traditionally sweet but boring characterization of the eternal fiance.

Under Bertrand de Billy, the Wiener Philharmoniker play with refreshing verve and spirit.