L’INCORONAZIONE DI POPPEA

CLAUDIO MONTEVERDI (1567-1643)

Opera in three acts with a prologue on a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello based on the Annals by Tacitus, premiered in 1642 in Venice.
Venice version of 1650

Elsa Benoit · Jake Arditti · Ambroisine Bré · Iestyn Davies · Alex Rosen · Stuart Jackson · Maya Kherani · Julie Roset · Laurence Kilsby · Riccardo Romeo · Yannis François

Cappella Mediterranea · Leonardo García Alarcón, conductor
Ted Huffman, stage director

How to take the place of the empress of Rome? Poppaea, a courtesan and mistress of Emperor Nero, removes every obstacle that stands between her and the throne: she leaves her lover, Otho, the philosopher Seneca commits suicide, Empress Octavia is banished, and finally she achieves her goal, marrying Nero. Through Monteverdi’s music, this triumph of immorality is elevated into a hymn to the power of desire. Monteverdi’s last opera is also the first masterpiece of the genre, extraordinarily and enduringly modern. Here, it is filmed at the Opéra Royal de Versailles, with a young and committed cast, guided through a mafia-baroque world by director Ted Huffman and the sensational Leonardo García Alarcón !

Show filmed on January 28th and 29th 2023 at the Royal Opera of Versailles

You may find the booklet, available in French and English, by clicking here

You may find this  recording on our online shop by clicking here