Salome

In the organizer's words:

Opera by Richard Strauss

Salome lives at the court of her mother Herodias and her stepfather Herod. The princess repeatedly hears the voice of the prophet Jochanaan, who is being held captive there. Driven by lustful fascination, she seeks an encounter with the ascetic and wants to kiss him, but he rebuffs her advances. Her lecherous stepfather agrees to fulfill Salome's every wish if she dances for him. However, the princess is shocked by her demand, as she wants Jochanaan's head - presented on a silver platter.

With his one-act play Salome , Oscar Wilde created a drama of captivating urgency in 1893. In it, the eponymous Judean princess, a projection screen for erotic fantasies and a demonized rebel, becomes a symbol of the conflict between asceticism and passion. Richard Strauss adapted the text of the drama into an opera that became a real scandal even before its premiere in 1905. This is not only due to the plot, which deliberately plays with the boundaries of morality at the time and transgresses them over long stretches, but also to Strauss' overwhelming music, which lends Wilde's text a completely new dimension. The combination of late romantic, shimmering soundscapes and the radical compositional language of early modernism astonished and delighted audiences of the time in equal measure. Salome became a global success and Strauss became a rich man as a result

The young director Noa Naamat, who has already worked at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and the Royal Opera in Copenhagen and has staged productions in Dresden, Weimar and Schwerin, among others, will bring Richard Strauss' masterpiece to the stage of Theater Hagen together with set designer Bettina John.