L’Orfeo

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The Greek National Opera presents, for the first time in its history, Claudio Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo in a new, captivating staging by the prominent visual artist William Kentridge, with an arrangement for contemporary instruments by Nico Muhly. L’Orfeo—a major international co-production of the GNO with the Glyndebourne Festival and the New York Metropolitan Opera—opens the 2026/27 season, running from 30 October to 14 November 2026, at the Stavros Niarchos Hall, under the baton of Konstantinos Terzakis. The production is made possible by a grant from the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) to enhance the GNO’s artistic outreach.

The production premiered last June at the Glyndebourne Festival, receiving a highly enthusiastic response from both audiences and critics. The leading British newspaper The Guardian praised William Kentridge’s ‘exhilarating creativity’, noting that his directorial and visual approach ‘animates’ Monteverdi’s music. Meanwhile, The Observer described his visual language as ‘rich, bold, confrontational, and obsessive’, adding that ‘this artist was never likely to settle for a supporting role. Instead, he engages, full throttle, with Monteverdi’s masterpiece’.

The boldness of Kentridge’s artistic approach speaks to the true nature of this opera, a work seen as groundbreaking from the moment of its debut. Claudio Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo premiered in Mantua in 1607 and is regarded as a defining event in music history because it marks the birth of opera as a complete dramatic art form. Although it is not typically considered the first opera ever written, it holds a prominent place in Western music history because it stands at the intersection of the late Renaissance and early Baroque. Through Alessandro Stiggio’s libretto, Monteverdi creates a new work in which speech, music, and action converge within a unified expressive system, combining structural simplicity with unprecedented expressive density. Through the recitatives, arias, choral and orchestral parts, Monteverdi moulds a musical universe in which speech and music function inseparably, serving the story with incredible immediacy. The famous aria ‘Possente spirto’, one of the opera’s major highlights, reflects music’s power as a medium for persuasion and emotion while revealing the protagonist’s technical and expressive virtuosity.

At the heart of the work lies the myth of Orpheus, a tale in which love, loss, and the power of art confront death. The story begins in the fields of Thrace, amidst a joyous atmosphere. Orpheus and Eurydice celebrate their wedding, surrounded by nymphs and shepherds. However, the news of Eurydice’s abrupt death violently turns the celebration into a lament. Refusing to accept her loss, Orpheus decides to descend into Hades to bring his beloved back from the land of the dead. At the Underworld’s gates, his music becomes his only weapon. Through his singing, he lulls Charon to sleep and then persuades the gods of Hades to allow Eurydice’s return. The lord of the Underworld, Pluto, ultimately agrees, yet on one condition: Orpheus must not look back until they have returned to the world of the living. Orpheus is overwhelmed by doubt, fear, and anxiety. Shortly before their return is complete, he glances back at Eurydice and thus loses her forever. Upon returning to Thrace, the hero sinks into despair until Apollo appears and urges him to transcend worldly pain and ascend with him to the heavens.

The production presents two different versions of the work’s finale simultaneously. In the first, Orpheus is torn apart by the Bacchae, while in the second, he ascends to the heavens with Apollo. Kentridge has chosen to keep both versions alive onstage, creating a paradoxical coexistence between the descent into the Underworld and the ascension to the sky, turning the opera’s finale into another reflection on death, loss, and immortality.

L’Orfeo, however, is not only a story about loss and love. At its core, it is a story about art’s power. Its hero becomes the artist par excellence who strives to transcend human limitations through his art, marshalling his music as his sole weapon against death. The opera itself begins with the allegorical figure of Music, as an embodiment of art who moves the entire plot forward. It is precisely this relationship among music, image, and the power of artistic creation that lies at the heart of William Kentridge’s directorial approach, who treats L’Orfeo as a work open to fresh readings. The myth becomes the inspiration for a multilayered visual universe in which memory, creation, loss, and time coexist, thereby crafting a stage language in constant motion through live action, drawings, moving images, video projections, and scenography. Another key reference in Kentridge’s directorial interpretation is Rainer Maria Rilke’s poetic version of the myth. Inspired by Rilke’s world, the production shifts the action to approximately 1910, creating a space where ancient myth intertwines with modern history. As Kentridge characteristically notes, ‘one of the interesting things in staging L’Orfeo was the openness that Monteverdi’s music gives us—both in the schematic form of the way the scenes are constructed, but also in the non-naturalism of the libretto and of the whole opera’.

Within this constantly shifting visual universe, Kentridge’s charcoal-drawing technique defines the performance’s dramaturgy. Drawings are created before the audience, then they are modified, erased, and reshaped into new images. This process appears to reflect Orpheus’ longing to go back in time while also engaging in a conversation with it. The constant transformation of the stage world allows action to move from Thracian fields to the Underworld and from ancient myth to the contemporary world without being confined to a specific historical representation. Just as drawings cannot return to the initial white page, so Orpheus cannot ultimately undo his loss. The past remains alive, even when the image has been erased. It is precisely this failure that Kentridge refers to when he describes the work’s essence as ‘the fear of death, the inescapability of death, and the absolute desire we have to undo, to unhappen a calamity that has happened’.

Born in 1955 in Johannesburg, William Kentridge is globally hailed as one of the most important and versatile contemporary visual artists, with a prominent presence in both audiovisual work and in opera and theatre. He studied political science and African studies at the University of Witwatersrand. He also attended the Johannesburg Art Foundation and studied theatre at the École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq in Paris. His method combines drawing, writing, film, performance, music, and theatre, with the goal of creating artworks influenced by politics, science, literature, and history. Kentridge rose to international acclaim in the 1990s with Drawings for Projection, a series of moving images he created by drawing, erasing, and redrawing with charcoal. These works—which treat apartheid, colonialism, memory, and complicity, among other themes—set the standard for how drawing, film, and performance are interconnected in his work. He has left his mark on emblematic opera productions, such as Mozart’s The Magic Flute, and Berg’s Wozzeck and Lulu, which have been performed at some of the world’s leading opera houses and festivals, including the New York Metropolitan Opera, La Scala in Milan, the English National Opera, and the Salzburg Festival. His works have been showcased at prominent museums and international events, including MoMA, the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Centre Pompidou in Paris, the Whitechapel Gallery, Tate Modern, the Royal Academy in London, and the Museo Reina Sofía in Madrid. He has also participated in documenta and the Venice Biennale, while his large-scale retrospective exhibitions have been presented at SFMOMA, MoMA, and the Albertina.

The concept of constant transformation also extends to the set itself, which serves as another space for creation and memory. Designed by Sabine Theunissen, the set transforms into an artist’s workshop, where real-life objects—ladders, chairs, desks, notebooks, papers, and speakers—coexist with projections of Kentridge’s drawings. Gregory Maqoma’s choreography adds another layer to the production’s multimedia stage language. Movement does not function as a decorative element but as an alternative form of storytelling.

The creative team also includes Greta Goiris, who is responsible for costumes; Urs Schönebaum, who is in charge of lighting; and Janus Fouché, who designed the videos. Emerging conductor Konstantinos Terzakis will lead the Orchestra of the Greek National Opera in his seventh collaboration with the GNO, following the operas La bohème and Carmen, the concert presentation of the opera Flora mirabilis, the ballets Coppélia and Carmen, and the 2025 International Opera Awards Ceremony. The GNO Chorus has been coached by Agathangelos Georgakatos.

The arrangement of the work for contemporary instruments bears the stamp of distinguished American composer and orchestrator Nico Muhly. This arrangement was presented for the first time at the Santa Fe Opera in New Mexico in 2023, under the baton of Harry Bicket, and will also be used for the production’s presentation at the New York Metropolitan Opera. Muhly’s work spans orchestral, stage, chamber, and religious music. He has received major commissions from the NY Metropolitan Opera, Carnegie Hall, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and other prestigious music organisations, and has collaborated with prominent artists and choreographers from diverse backgrounds.

For L’Orfeo, the Greek National Opera has assembled an excellent cast of accomplished Greek protagonists. The title role will be performed by renowned tenor Christos Kechris, who has sung numerous roles at the GNO since 2009. One of his recent standout performances was in the GNO Alternative Stage’s production Viva la mamma!. Portraying La Musica and Euridice will be the celebrated soprano Maria Kostraki. She has had an important presence in operas and concerts at major international theatres and festivals, including the Kammeroper in Munich, the Nuremberg State Opera, and the Spoleto Theatre. The role of La Messaggera will be performed by the distinguished Greek soprano Mary-Ellen Nesi, who has carved out a significant international career, spanning more than 40 leading roles at Europe, America, and Asia’s top opera houses, along with a remarkable discography. At the GNO, she has stood out in many productions, including the challenging title role in the opera The Murderess. Distinguished bass Petros Magoulas will return to the GNO as Plutone, following his performance as Henry VIII in Anna Bolena during the 2025/26 season. Tenor Yannis Kalyvas, well known among GNO audiences and with a strong track record in major roles in remarkable opera productions, will portray Pastore I / Spirito.