Idomeneo

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Image courtesy of the Liceu.

Premiered in Munich in 1781, Mozart wrote Idomeneo when, at the age of twenty-five, he was performing his third “opera seria,” after Lucio Silla and Il Re pastore.

With a precocious dramatic talent, Mozart assimilated a revolutionary style from Haydn, extracting some lessons about the comic-dramatic nature and adapting it to his own language, becoming an absolute modernization of the genre. Thus, Idomeneo, an extraordinary score, represents a major challenge for the composer when it comes to fusing a new hybrid model (the flexibility of French tragedy with the lyricism of Italian opera).

The protagonists of the plot are the sons of the heroes of the Iliad, the Greek epic poem that narrates the war between the Greeks and the Trojans that ended with the destruction of Troy. Thus, Idamante has an enormous dramatic weight, Ilia is a softer character, Elettra is expressive in her archetypal madness, while Idomeneo, in his nobility, will serenely renounce his throne to announce peace, while Neptune grants forgiveness, which was so much of the enlightened taste.

Under the direction of Belgian master René Jacobs, the Freiburg Barockorchester will offer one of the most profound, reflective and human interpretations of Idomeneo ever heard. He portrays with energy and fantasy the story of a king's promise to the god Neptune to sacrifice the first person he sees if he arrives home safely. In fact, it questions the entire concept of religion: “Love is worth more than a promise made in fear,” says Jacobs. While in Mozatr's time Idomeneo was criticized as the latest metamorphosis of an obsolete genre, he left behind a work with true creative fury.

Jacobs, a true specialist in this repertoire, achieves a hypnotic, charming and surprising bouquet to explore all the nuances of vulnerable characters in their intimacy.

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