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Carmen | Official tourism website

The Belgian musician, René Jacobs, will conduct a single performance of a new adaptation of the opera by Georges Bizet, based on the novel by Prosper Mérimée, on 27 March at the Teatro Real.

The production features the sopranos, Gaëlle Arquez in the role of Carmen and Sabine Devieilhe as Micaela. Don José is played by the French tenor, François Rougier. They are all accompanied by the Baroque B’Rock orchestra and the Young Singers from the ORCAM choir.

This opera in four acts, with a libretto written by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, was first performed in Paris in 1875 and has become one of the best known and most popular operas in the operatic repertoire. It is set in Seville in 1820, where Carmen, a seductive and free gypsy woman who works in a tobacco factory, lives. Her attractiveness wins the heart of the soldier Don José, who is initially engaged to Micaela, but who finds himself irresistibly attracted to Carmen.

The relationship between Carmen and Don José gets complicated as he is drawn into the world of smuggling and crime as a result of his obsession with her. However, these sacrifices are in vain when Carmen decides to give her affection to the bullfighter, Escamillo. This sends Don José into a spiral of pain, hatred and jealousy.

Born in Ghent (Belgium) in 1946, René Jacobs is a countertenor and Baroque and classical opera orchestra conductor who works with ensembles such as the Concerto Köln, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the Akademie Für Alte Musik Berlin or the Nederlands Kamerkoor. He is also an interpretation and Baroque singing teacher at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in Switzerland and artistic director of the Innsbruck Festival of Ancient Music (Austria).

Artistic File:

  • Orchestra Conductor - René Jacobs
  • Choirmaster - Thibault Lenaerts

Cast:

  • Carmen - Gaëlle Arquez
  • Don José - François Rougier
  • Escamillo - Thomas Dolié
  • Micaela - Sabine Devieilhe
  • Frasquita - Margot Genet
  • Mercedes - Séraphine Cortez
  • Le Dancaïre - Emiliano González Toro
  • Le Remendado - Grégoire Mour
  • Morales - Yoann Dubruque
  • Orchestra  - B’Rock
  • Choir - Young Singers from the ORCAM

Programme:

Comic Opera in Four Acts

  • Music by Georges Bizet (1838-1875)
  • Libretto by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the novel of the same name (1845) by Prosper Mérimée
  • Premièred at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 3 March 1875
  • Premièred at the Teatro Real on 14 March 1888

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Lorie Orum

Update: 2024-05-20