Der Rosen­kavalier

After Hugo von Hofmannsthal and Richard Strauss had brought Elektra, their first collaboration, to the stage—a work that was powerful in many respects – they followed it up in 1911 with Der Rosenkavalier. It no longer sounds archaically harsh, but rather sways with waltz-like softness; yet it remains a powerful work when the fabulously wealthy Herr von Faninal “sells” – no, “bargains away”; perhaps most accurately: “delivers” – his only daughter Sophie as a bride to the dissolute country nobleman Baron Ochs of Lerchenau, a coarse rake and practicing Don Juan. Faninal knows full well that money can buy anything. But if one truly wants to belong in the late heyday of Theresian Vienna (as well as that of the fin de siècle – and presumably the present day too), one needs a lineage that, if not flawless, is at least as long as possible. Origin is the future. Whatever pedigree old Ochs von Lerchenau carries with him, young Count Octavian Rofrano has at least that much.
On top of that, he’s gorgeous and a real gentleman. So refined, so perfect, and above all so completely different from everything around her that when he presents her with a silver rose, Sophie feels as if she could die right then and there. “Where have I ever been before and felt so blissful?” she asks herself, knowing: “I must return there!” And since returning is always such a tricky thing, especially when it comes to the past, she senses: “Even if it means my death.” It will never again be as beautiful as it could have been. In their second collaboration, Axel Ranisch and Nicholas Carter explore the finely chiseled aestheticism of the Rosenkavalier score and stage what is arguably the most melancholic comedy of all time as a chilling fairy tale.