Premiere KING ROGER

Karol Szymanowski

This season, in the co-production with the CNT Ivan pl. Zajc, the Savonlinna Opera Festival, one of the most significant opera festivals in Europe, is staging one of the most important opera works of the 20^th century. The story of the rational and irrational, between order and chaos, truth and illusion, will be told by the European team and soloists gathered for the opera that is staged in Croatia for the first time, the opera that is filled with the beautiful, penetrating and expressive music, virtuoso arias and dramatic chorus parts. The opera follows the Christian king Roger II, who experiences a transformation having met a young shepherd representing pagan ideals, a total opposition to all of what the king holds. It is happiness and pleasure, chaos and death that intertwine in that conflict. What happens when a self-confident king led by logic and order, a happy husband, a man who believes he has everything, comes up against a force more powerful than his position, force that makes him re-evaluate his own life? Szymanowski questions these always relevant philosophical questions through the dualism of the leading characters and chorus, clearly depicting their inner states. After the performances in Rijeka, the opera will be performed at the prestigious opera festival in Finland.