Lyric Opera 2018-2019 Issue 4 Siegfried

P R O F I L E S | L Y R I C O P E R A O F C H I C A G O 26 | November 3 - 16, 2018 JOHAN ENGELS (Original Set Designer) Previously at Lyric: Four productions since 2013/14, most recently Die Walküre (2017/18); Das Rheingold (2016/17); The Passenger (2014/15). The South African designer (1952-2014) was renowned internationally for his work in opera, theater, and ballet. His designs for The Passenger have been integral to the success of Mieczysław Weinberg’s opera – first in its world stage premiere at the 2010 Bregenz Festival and subsequently in London, Warsaw, Houston (American premiere), New York, Chicago, Detroit, and Miami. In addition to his Bregenz productions, highlights of Engels’s operatic career included productions for London’s Royal Opera House, Covent Garden (Arne’s Artaxerxes ), the Zurich Opera House (such rarities as Johann Strauss II’s Simplicius, Montemezzi’s L’amore dei tre re, and Chabrier’s L’étoile ), the Opéra de Marseille ( Ring cycle), LA Opera ( L’elisir d’amore , also seen in Madrid, Geneva, and Graz), the Salzburg Festival ( Turandot ), Welsh National Opera ( Khovanshchina, Lulu, Don Carlos , the latter coproduced with Houston Grand Opera), the Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Opéra National de Paris, Opera North, and Finnish National Opera, among many other companies. In British theater the designer was associated with the Donmar Warehouse (including David Leveaux’s production of Sophocles’s Electra , which transferred to Broadway), Royal Shakespeare Company, Almeida Theatre, and Chichester Festival. ROBERT INNES HOPKINS (Set Designer) Previously at Lyric: Die Walküre (2017/18); Das Rheingold (2016/17); Rigoletto (2012/13, 2005/06). The renowned British designer has earned equal acclaim in opera and theater. Highlighting the 2018/19 season are The Lady in the Van (Theatre Royal, Bath), Julius Caesar (Royal Shakespeare Company), and a new production of War and Peace (Welsh National Opera), the latter a collaboration with his frequent colleague, director David Pountney. Among Hopkins’s many previous productions with Pountney have been Prince Igor (Zurich Opera House), Carmen (Bolshoi Theatre), and most recently Iain Bell’s In Parenthesis (Welsh National Opera, world premiere). Among the designer’s most important operatic achievements are works of Verdi ( Rigoletto , Welsh National Opera), Wagner ( The Flying Dutchman , WNO; Lohengrin , San Francisco Opera; Tristan und Isolde , Venice), Janáček ( The Cunning Little Vixen , San Francisco Opera), Britten ( Peter Grimes, Billy Budd , both at The Santa Fe Opera), Puccini ( Madama Butterfly , Den Jyske Opera in Aarhus, Denmark), and Bernd Alois Zimmermann ( Die Soldaten for the Ruhr Triennale, which won Germany’s highly prestigious Opernwelt Award). The designer’s theater credits include productions at the Chichester Festival ( King Lear , also seen at the Brooklyn Academy of Music), in London for the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Old Vic, Nottingham Playhouse, and Bristol Old Vic, among other companies. MARIE-JEANNE LECCA (Costume Designer) Previously at Lyric: Die Walküre (2017/18); Das Rheingold (2016/17); The Passenger (2014/15). The Romanian-born, London-based designer’s operatic work has been seen internationally in more than 40 productions directed by David Pountney, most recently War and Peace (Cardiff premiere, subsequent tour to five British theaters), La forza del destino (Cardiff), and a Weill/Schoenberg triple bill (Opéra National du Rhin). Lecca later this season will design for Pountney’s new productions of Un ballo in maschera (WNO), Manon Lescaut (La Scala), and I vespri siciliani (Bonn Opernhaus). She has collaborated extensively with other prominent directors, among them Keith Warner and Francesca Zambello. Her costumes for The Passenger have been seen in Bregenz (world stage premiere), Warsaw, London, Houston (U.S. premiere), Chicago, New York, Miami, and Detroit. Lecca’s diverse repertoire also encompasses Mozart ( The Magic Flute, Bregenz); Wagner ( Rienzi, Vienna; Tristan und Isolde , Cologne; Ring cycle, Covent Garden); Puccini ( Il trittico , Lyon; Turandot , Salzburg); French works ( Carmen , Moscow, Houston, Seattle; Salammbo , Paris; La juive , Zurich; Pelléas et Mélisande , Cardiff); 20th-century German repertoire ( Die Frau ohne Schatten , Zurich; Moses und Aron , Munich; Wozzeck , Covent Garden; Die Soldaten, Ruhrtriennale, New York; Lulu , WNO); Slavic works ( Prince Igor, Zurich; King Roger, Bregenz); and musical theater ( Pacific Overtures, London; West Side Story, Bregenz). Lecca received the Martinů Medal for Julietta (Opera North) and The Greek Passion (Covent Garden). FABRICE KEBOUR (Lighting Designer) Previously at Lyric: Die Walküre (2017/18); Das Rheingold (2016/17); The Passenger (2014/15). In addition to Lyric’s Siegfried , the French lighting designer’s work will be seen in five other new productions this season, among them Michael Jarrell’s Bérénice (world premiere, Opéra National de Paris), Un ballo in maschera (Welsh National Opera), and Manon Lescaut (La Scala). Revivals of other productions will be seen in nine other major European opera houses, among them the Vienna Volksoper and Staatsoper, the Polish National Opera, the Opéra de Lausanne, and the Israeli Opera. Kebour’s most recent work also includes Simon Boccanegra (Flanders Opera), La forza del destino (Vienna State Opera), Faust (Opéra National de Paris), The Magic Flute (Bregenz Festival), and productions for Paris’s Châtelet, and the Mariinsky Theater, among many other houses. Kebour’s non-theatrical work includes designing the 2006 opening and closing ceremonies of the 15th Asian Games in Doha and the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space exhibit “Light Speaks”, a retrospective of world-renowned lighting designers. Kebour has received three Molière Award nominations and one Welsh Theatre Award nomination for best lighting design. DENNI SAYERS (Choreographer) Previously at Lyric: Eight productions since 2000-01, among them Die Walküre (2017/18); The Magic Flute (2016/17); Porgy and Bess (2014/15, 2008/09). The British choreographer and director began the current season collaborating with David Pountney as assistant director and choreographer of War and Peace at Welsh National Opera. Later in the season she will choreograph Pountney’s new Manon Lescaut at La Scala. Sayers, who has worked on eight productions at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, since 1999, collaborates regularly with many other major directors, including Neil Armfield ( Hamlet , Glyndebourne), Adrian Noble ( Hansel und Gretel , Vienna), and Jonathan Kent ( Manon Lescaut , Covent Garden). She has also enjoyed close associations with Francesca Zambello (including Washington National Opera’s Ring cycle, remounted last season at San Francisco Opera) and the late Nikolaus Lehnhoff (six productions, among them Turandot at La Scala‚ Elektra at the Salzburg Festival, and Parsifal at English National Opera). Sayers’s