NZ's freshest young opera talent performs alongside veterans of the stage to present a fiery tale of sacrifice, danger, and triumph.
First performed in 1734 at the Covent Garden Theatre, Handel's rarely performed baroque Oreste opera is a tightly woven exploration of love and lust; a desperate search for sanity in a world built on fear; a bitter struggle between destiny and desire.
Magically saved from sacrifice at her own father's knife, Iphigenia is bound to serve the goddess Diana on the island of Tauris under the tyrannical rule of a king living in fear. As the blood of all strangers must be cast over the island's altar, fate brings Orestes, Iphigenia's estranged brother, to its shores.
Hear Handel's Oreste performed in a semi-staged production by the combined forces of the Auckland Opera Studio and NZ Barok orchestra.
The instrumentalists of NZ Barok, New Zealand's own original instrument baroque orchestra take to the stage of the Mercury Theatre alongside the vocal soloists to bring Handel's score to life. Recitatives will be sung in English and arias in Italian.
