Conductor Markus Stenz
Chorus master Lorenzo Fratini
Director Daniele Menghini
Set design Davide Signorini
Costumes Nika Campisi
Lighting Gianni Bertoli
Choreography Sofia Nappi
Orchestra and Chorus of Maggio Musicale Fiorentino
Children’s Chorus of Accademia del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino

87th Maggio Musicale Fiorentino 2025
First performance in Italy in the original language
Surtitles in Italian and English by Prescott Studio

Florence, Teatro del Maggio
17, 21, 23, 25, 28, 31 May

*

Der junge Lord (The Young Lord), staged to great fuss at the Deutsche Oper Berlin in 1965, is an opera with a constantly redifining centre of gravity which, while firmly embracing a recognizable musical and scenic narrative, constantly ambushes the audience and performers, resorting to a skilful and original stylistic play of masks where, in the end, a bitter surrender to hypocrisy prevails.

The conductor of this production, Markus Stenz, one of the most accomplished and inspiring interpreters of Henze’s music, considers Der junge Lord already a ‘classic’, «a masterpiece of the past century; in this score, everything makes sense – on an instinctive, textual and theatrical level». And the response from the Maggio Orchestra is of of thrilling enthusiasm, according to Mr. Stenz.

This is how the director, Daniele Menghini, comments on his approach to this title, absent from Italian scene. «It is a great joy to work on such a ‘clandestine’ title […]. We need to find a connection with Henze, with his urgency to tell the story of a world that is changing, emerging from the Second World War and reconfiguring itself. This society is coming to terms with its fears: the new, the different, some horizons. This is condensed in Henze’s music, [to the point of making it] dangerous, sharp, cutting – and you have to [know how to] seek [this] taste of the grotesque […]. Here we are faced with a choral work […]. The cast carries the drama forward, but always together with the masses, the actors, the acrobats, the circus […]. Every element […] of the stage design is dramaturgy. So it is not enough […] to focus on the protagonists because there are no protagonists here».