Toward the end of the summer of 1964, John Coltrane left his studio with the draft of a composition that would serve as the foundational text for a whole new genre. Here and there, some schematic indications for the piano or the bass and, in the bottom margin of the score, the following exclamation—All paths lead to God / Prayer entitled—A Love Supreme—hastily scribbled in ballpoint.

To tie in with the world creation of Le Silence des ombres, we asked Benjamin Attahir to provide brief answers to the following questions.

In Bartók / Beethoven / Schönberg, Rosas stages three repertoire pieces in an evening arrangement. The performance is branched throughout the oeuvre of Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker, propagating roots in the early years but also displaying the various transformations over the years. Dance is an art that is continuously changing but always exists in the now, something made clear by Bartók / Beethoven / Schönberg.

Mystery, suspense and an intangible truth that is beyond words: the work of Belgium’s first and as yet only winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature Maurice Maeterlinck never divulges all his secrets. Not even in the Three Little Dramas for Marionnettes (Trois petits drames pour marionettes, 1894), three succinct and unheimlich pieces of theatre poetry revived today in the form of a new La Monnaie opera entitled Le Silence des ombres.

It is with pride and conviction that I present to you the first season of my third mandate at La Monnaie. As represented in this brochure, it reflects an important evolution: for the first time, we did not elaborate around a specific season theme, but rather around a new ‘architecture’, which can serve as a blueprint for the seasons to come. This new structure will allow us to give creation and experimentation every chance, and at the same time we will ensure that this turn towards the future is not synonymous with discontinuity. We will keep offering you projects of the very highest level, with in 2019–20 no fewer than eleven opera titles. This is a record, but also, given the number of new productions, a huge challenge for all the departments and staff members of our house.

In the last few years, Barbara Hannigan has made unforgettable debuts in several soprano roles at La Monnaie, founded a mentoring initiative for young singers and won a Grammy. Now, with a semi-staged version of Stravinsky’s “diabolic” opera The Rake’s Progress, she will be making her debut as… an operatic conductor. Time for an interview with this Canadian superstar, who, with that many talents, surely must have made her own pact with the devil.

The soprano Véronique Gens is a regular on our stage. She made her debut here as Donna Elvira (Don Giovanni) and then performed Iphigénie (Iphigénie en Aulide), Roi Gaële (Alceste), Vitellia (La clemenza di Tito) and, most recently, Madame Lidoine (Dialogues des Carmélites). She is also a passionate interpreter of French mélodie.

The director Laurent Pelly returns to La Monnaie this December with Don Pasquale. We were able to interview him at the end of the summer, a few days before he left for Philadelphia where he presented a new production of Lucia di Lammermoor in September. A conversation devoted to Donizetti.

Johann Sebastian Bach’s music has made regular appearances in Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker's oeuvre. The Six Brandenburg Concerti marked her fifth performance to the music of the German baroque composer. Yet it was only in 1994, fourteen years after her first choreography Violin Phase, that she began to work with Bach's own music in the performance Toccata.

No right-minded person out alone on the street would wish to encounter the characters from From the house of the dead! And yet Janáček has the power to shine a light in the darkest corners of humanity with music that exudes intensity, vulnerability, power and humour. Conductor Michael Boder explains why Janáček’s last opera is so unusual.

The chorus leader of our social programme ‘A bridge between two worlds’ has devoted ten long years to sparking and escalating an enthusiasm for singing in inmates in several Belgian prisons. A conversation with a musical fire accelerant.

In his last great work, Janáček flatly ignored the basic rules of the theatre: From the House of the Dead is an opera without heroes. The piece is a montage of powerful dramatic scenes and narrations, in which each of the various protagonists in turn steps out of the anonymous male chorus to tell his tale. Sometimes that tale takes up a whole scene, sometimes the protagonist sings a single line. Separating the close on twenty (!) soloist roles poses a huge challenge for both the director and the spectator. It helps that in this labour camp, as in all dystopias, everyone is equal, but some are more equal than others. These five prisoners are most in the spotlight and they provide the spectator with a holdfast in the narrative.