Mazepa by Tchaikovsky, P. I., From (2022/2022), Directed by Dieter Kaegi, Conductor Yannis Pouspourikas, Francis Benichou, Stadttheater Biel, Biel/Bienne, Switzerland

Tchaikovsky's romantic opera "Mazeppa" is filled with mad and fatal love, political entanglements and bloodthirsty cruelties. Maria rejects a young suitor Andrei, because she loves Mazeppa, a Cossack leader much older than her. Against her father's wishes, she leaves the family to spend her life with Mazeppa. The father thinks only of revenge and unleashes fatal misfortunes one after the other. While Alexander Pushkin emphasizes in the literary text the warlike events between Russian soldiers and Ukrainian insurgents, Tchaikovsky focuses more on the love story and the tragic fate of Maria. Created in 1884 at the Bolshoi Theater in the time between “Eugène Onegin” and “La Dame de Pique”, the opera “Mazeppa” has long remained in the shadow of these two famous masterpieces. Dieter Kaegi will stage this rare precious work in the conception of Dirk Hofacker ("Radames / Lohengrin", "Masterclass"). The future TOBS concert director Yannis Pouspourikas will assume the musical direction.