Merlin by Albéniz, I., Sa. 19 Nov. 2011, Ab (2011/2011), Unter der Regie von Roland Schwab,, Dirigat Heiko Mathias Förster, Musiktheater im Revier, Gelsenkirchen, Deutschland

Stranded in nowhere, out of time. The magician Merlin ends the dark epoch of mankind and drives instincts and urges out of the world. The mystical morning dawns: England is to get a ruler. – King Arthur! But the fairy Morgan claims the throne for her son. What she can't do with violence, she can do with cunning: Merlin's fate is what he repressed. Increased by dead and dead, it overtakes mankind as fate... "More than a document of its time", director Roland Schwab calls the opera "Merlin". "Created in an epoch of rampant occultism in 1901, it reflects the dangerousness of worldviews based on repression, conspiracy theories and historical distortions in the camouflage suit of a legend. In view of the attacks in Oslo and Utoya, this is an extremely topical play. Isaac Albéniz worked all his life on his three-part myths project, but before his death he was only able to complete the first part of the legend, the story of the power politician and seducer Merlin. With oriental coloring and somber monastic chants, the Spanish composer conjures up musical images full of enchanting beauty in a summer night's sound fantasies, written in English following the origin of the saga. Nevertheless, Albéniz was not allowed to live to see the scenic realization of his work: It was not until 1950, of all things, that a football club performed "Merlin" for the first time in Barcelona and it took another 53 years until the work, thanks to the reconstruction of the conductor José de Eusebio for the Teatro Real in Madrid, was performed in 2003 was to be experienced again on a stage.