Werther by Massenet, From (2023/2023), Directed by Herbert Föttinger, Conductor Anthony Bramall, Oleg Ptashnikov, Gärtnerplatztheater, Munich, Germany

The famous epistolary novel »The Sorrows of Young Werther«, in which Goethe wrote down his own experiences from his soul, triggered a wave of suicides all over Europe after its publication in 1774. The emotionality characteristic of the text is whipped up to even greater intensity by the music by Jules Massenet, whose »Werther« premiered in 1892. Herbert Föttinger stages the opera as a psychological chamber play about an awakening love of life and the difficulty of breaking out of the familiar milieu.