Enescu's Œdipe

George Enescu's Œdipe from the Bregenz Festival.

An all-too-rare staging of Enescu's masterpiece. A retelling of the Oedipus story, it's a work which occupied Enescu for a quarter of a century before its hugely successful premiere in Paris in 1936. It's a work admired for its ambition, its daunting demands and for the sheer originality of its music.

A terrible curse weighs on King Laïos of Thebes. The oracle of Delphi has prophesied that he will be slain by his firstborn and that he will marry his own mother Jocaste. Fearing the prophecy, Laïos orders a shepherd to kill his son Œdipe immediately after birth. But fate would have it otherwise...

Presented by Georgia Mann with guest Nigel Simeone.

George Enescu: Œdipe, tragédie lyrique in four acts and six scenes
Libretto by Edmond Fleg, partly based on the tragedies King Oedipus and Oedipus at Colonos by Sophocles.

Œdipe ..... Paul Gay (bass-baritone)
Tirésias .... Ante Jerkunica (bass-baritone)
Créon .... Tuomas Pursio (baritone)
Le Berger (Shepherd) .... Mihails Čuļpajevs (tenor)
Le Grand Prêtre (High priest) .... Nika Guliashvili (bass)
Phorbas / Le Veilleur .... Vazgen Gazaryan (bass)
Thésée .... Nikita Ivasechko (baritone)
Laïos .... Michael Heim (tenor)
Jocaste .... Marina Prudenskaya (mezzo-soprano)
La Sphinge (The Sphinx) .... Anna Danik (mezzo-soprano)
Antigone .... Iris Candelaria (soprano)
Mérope .... Tone Kummervold (mezzo-soprano)
Prague Philharmonic Choir
Vienna Symphony Orchestra
Hannu Lintu (conductor)

Œdipe survives and grows up as the son of King Polybos and Queen Merope in Corinth. They never tell him about his origins. As a teenager, however, Œdipe finds out about the portentous prophecy. He leaves his alleged parents to flee his fate. On the way to Thebes, where he defeats the Sphinx, Œdipe starts an argument with a stranger and beats him to death. Celebrated as an anonymous hero, he is crowned the new king and marries the widowed Queen. What he does not know: The man he killed was his father and the woman he marries is his mother, Jocasta. This heinous crime does not go unpunished. A plague haunts Thebes and Œdipe, guilty by accident, realizes that he fulfilled his prophecy a long time ago. Jocasta commits suicide, Œdipe blinds himself and leaves his family and Thebes. After suffering decades of isolation, the Gods finally grant Œdipe mercy and lead him back into the light.