Christian Øland has won over audiences and critics alike with his first opera production as the new General Music Director in Magdeburg. At the premiere of Massenet’s Manon, directed by James Bonas, the standing ovations paid tribute not least to the young Danish conductor’s nuanced and dynamic musical interpretation.
Like Puccini’s Manon Lescaut, Massenet’s opera is based on the novel Histoire du Chevalier Des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut by Abbé Prévost. "One can appreciate the no less passionate quality (...) of Massenet’s music in Christian Øland’s brilliant interpretation of the opera,” wrote the magazine Der Opernfreund. “With an unwavering eye for detail, energy, vigour and élan, he has crafted a compelling interpretation of Massenet’s music. His conducting, characterised by rousing dynamism, a keen sense of instrumental timbres, but also the dramatic, subtle and (often unjustly criticised) ‘simple’ qualities of this music, is a compelling tribute to Massenet.”
"The new Chief Conductor Christian Øland and his Magdeburg Philharmonic throw themselves wholeheartedly into the French idiom of the music. He is able to let the tragedy-tinged sadness shine through the lightness of the music and thus move the listener," stated the nmz.
The drama about longing and seduction as well as the inner conflict between the desire for freedom and a sense of duty can be seen in Magdeburg until 7 June.
Theater Magdeburg
