Hänsel und Gretel - Schedule, Program & Tickets

Hänsel und Gretel

Hansel and Gretel are the children of a poor broombinder and his wife. One day, when they play cocky instead of doing their job, the mother sends her into the forest as a punishment to collect berries. Shortly thereafter, the father comes home after a successful day and with a basket full of delicious things home. He reproaches his wife for the children, because in the forest a dangerous witch is up to mischief. The parents go in search of their children. In the meantime, Hansel and Gretel have filled their baskets, but because of hunger, they have eaten all their own berries. When they want to search new, they realize that it has already become dark. They got lost in the woods. They decide to go to sleep and say their evening prayer. In the dream, they experience wonderful things. The next morning they find themselves in front of a strange house made of gingerbread and sugar. When they want to snack on it, the witch suddenly appears and captures her. Hansel is to be roasted in the oven, but by a ruse the children manage instead to push the witch into the oven. At the same moment, the magic gives way, and all the many children who have been transformed into gingerbread by the witch are restored to their form and freed. When then the parents appear, the family is finally reunited. Happy, they go home.

Engelbert Humperdinck's HÄNSEL UND GRETEL has been one of the most popular operas for the whole family for more than 100 years. Traditionally performed around Christmas, the work was initially considered by the Humperdinck family as a "family evil". Adelheid Wette, the composer's sister, wrote a fairy tale play for her children based on the Grimm Brothers' fairy tale of the same name and asked her brother to make some songs out of it. The piece, called in the family jargon of Wagner enthusiast Humperdinck a "nursery devotional game", should be performed on the occasion of the birthday of the father. What in 1890 saw the light of day as the piano version, was completed three years later by the composer as a great opera. Humperdinck had not been able to resist the temptation of turning the work into a two-hour symphonic masterpiece with its catchy tunes and dramatic story, not just for children. It has been translated into over twenty languages ​​and still today is the first encounter with the world of opera for many children.

Musically, this sophisticated work does not hide its closeness to Wagner, but it also captivates less experienced ears. Cleverly placed "evergreens" like a little man standing in the woods, in the evening when I go to sleep ', fourteen angels standing around me or the little Sandman I help with the orientation and stay long after extinguishing the stage lights in memory.
Andreas Homoki and his stage designer Wolfgang Gussmann tell the story child-friendly and straightforward. They oppose the opulence of music with lightness and a poetic imagery that reaches its magical climax, especially in the night scenes in the forest. Of course, drama and theatrical cinematic effects are not missing, and the witch's appearance, eagerly awaited by all the children, is thrilling but not staged without comedy. Children from about six years, their joy is in the win at the end of the fight against evil and Hansel and Gretel were transformed by their courage and ingenuity not only itself, but also all the other by the witch in Gingerbread to Humperdinck's fairytale, Show children the way to freedom.

»Director Andreas Homoki does not want to abuse the piece for psychological sophistication or ideological announcements. He wants to show a piece for children. With intelligence and wit, he goes to work ... «[DeutschlandRadio Köln]

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