Die Liebe stört der kalte Tod

Lilith Stangenberg plays the role of a young woman preparing for the role of Orphea. This is the female version of Orpheus from ancient Greece. His wife, Eurydice, dies from a snake bite. The inconsolable singer Orpheus uses the power of his music, which even the hellhound obeys, to gain access to the underworld and bring his beloved back. However, the miracle is conditional on him not looking back at her on his way to the light. When he does so, he loses Eurydice forever. This is a subtle condition imposed by the gods. But it also corresponds to the experience that, although women can save their husbands from death row in improbable ways, as in Beethoven's opera Fidelio, successful rescues of women by their husbands in opera, i.e. sopranos by tenors, are rare. Lilith Stangenberg as Orphea proves in several roles that love is capable of bringing the dead back to life. (C.S.)