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BAYREUTH BAROQUE announces further program highlights
The festival will take place from September 1 to 12, 2021

 In 2021, the International Festival of the Opera Seria BAYREUTH BAROQUE will take place from 01st to the 12thSeptember for the second time. In addition to the revival of Nicola Porpora‘s “Carlo il Calvo”, another opera by the same composer will bring the jewel that is the Margravial Opera House in Bayreuth to life again. The artistic director of the festival, stage director and countertenor Max Emanuel Cencic will also, as much can be revealed, play a leading role in this opera. George Petrou will take over the musical direction with the orchestra Armonia Atenea.
The Bayreuth Baroque Festival is particularly pleased to present three concerts with  internationally celebrated stars.The virtuosic countertenor Franco Fagioli will give a concert of arias by Leonardo Vinci, the antipode of Porpora.George Petrou will conduct the evening with his orchestra Armonia Atenea. Under the title “Anima Aeterna”, countertenor Jakub Józef Orliński and the ensemble Il Pomo d’Oro under the direction of Francesco Corti go on a search for baroque gems. The soprano Simone Kermes sings "Canzonetta d’amore" accompanied by the Amici Veneziani.
Due to current events, the complete program of the festival will be announced at the end of June. Subsequently,advance ticket sales will start.
The Bayreuth Baroque Festival took place for the first time in 2020 with great success. Due to the hygiene measures in force in Bavaria, only 200 spectators were allowed in the theater to see the performances. In the online edition of the festival and in the media library of Bayerischer Rundfunk, there were over 500,000 views and Mezzo TV broadcastthe festival to 70 million households worldwide. In March 2021,  the artistic director of the festival, Max Emanuel Cencic, was awarded the German Schallplattenkritik Prize for his artistic work.
You can find more information about the festival at: www.bayreuthbaroque.de/

Max Emanuel Cencic receives the Honorary Award of the Deutsche Schallplattenkritik 2021 for Classical Music

The Countertenor Max Emanuel Cencic has been awarded the Honorary Award of the Deutsche Schallplattenkritik 2021 for Classical Music. In 2020, in the midst of the corona crisis, Max Emanuel Cencic and his Bayreuth Baroque Team managed to bring his festival of baroque music in Bayreuth to the stage with an extensive program as planned and without having to cancel a single event. For this, the countertenor who?s now also the festival director was awarded the honorary prize in the "Classical" category by Deutsche Schallplattenkritik on March 11, 2021.
 
Following is the jury's reasoning under the direction of Manuel Brug:
 
Usually, one artist receives this honorary award for his »life's work«. In the case of Max Cencic, we are gifted with a multi talented personality.
As a six-year-old, he was already a radiant boy soprano and was singing the powerful aria of the Queen of the Night. After being with the Vienna Boys' Choir, he appeared in George Solti's Magic Flute. Max then changed from soprano to countertenor. As such, he impresses with an extroverted personality in the most difficult roles. He also appears on many CDs that he produced himself from the start. He is director, record producer, agency owner, impresario and recently became artistic director of the Bayreuth Baroque festival. The festival takes place in the glamorously restored Margravial Opera House and is filled with da-capo arias. Here again, Max Emanuel Cencic surprises with excellence and innovation. One prize for all Cencics is more than justified!
Manuel Brug's ceremony for Max Emanuel Cencic can be seen here.
 
For the remainder of the 2020/21 season, there are still some outstanding projects to come for the countertenor. These include a house debut at the Paris Opera in a new production of Dalbavie's Le Soulier de Satin, the title role in a new production of Hasse's Cajo Fabrizio and Rossini's La Donna del Lago at the Festival in Saaremaa where the artist will sing the challenging role of Malcolm and stage the opera once more. In the summer of 2021, Max Emanuel Cencic will devote himself entirely to the artistic preparations for his Bayreuth Baroque festival that will take place from the 1st to the 14th September 2021. He will stage two opera productions in which he will also perform key roles.
 
Dear Max Emanuel,
congratulations from your Parnassus team!

Bayreuth Baroque Festival , 1st to 14th September 2021

In 2020, against all the adversities of the corona crisis, the Bayreuth Baroque Opera Festival was one of the few festivals in Europe that was able to carry out its program as announced. This year, from September 1st to 14th 2021, the festival will present once more some Baroque jewels in the UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Margravial Opera House.
 
The first highlight of this year's edition is the revival of Nicola Porpora's opera Carlo il Calvo on September 1st, 3rd and 5th. With Julia Lezhneva, Franco Fagioli, Max Emanuel Cencic, Bruno de Sá and George Petrou, the world-class line-up of the previous year is able to return in this production. The opera was rediscovered and staged by Max Emanuel Cencic. The production was acclaimed across Europe and was recently voted "Best New Production of 2020" by the readers of the online French magazine ForumOpéra.
 
The first edition of the Bayreuth Baroque Festival took place during the first year of the Corona crisis. Only 200 spectators were able to be present during the performances in the theater, however, the online edition of the festival on the Bayerischer Rundfunk and Mezzo TV reached countless viewers worldwide.
 
In March 2021, Max Emanuel Cencic, who is the artistic director of the festival was awarded the Deutsche Schallplattenkritik for Classical Music Honorary Prize for his artistic work. The presentation of this award will take place during the festival in 2021.
 
The Bayreuth Baroque Festival 2021 program will be announced by May and the advance sales will follow.

ForumOpera: Carlo il Calvo 'Best New Production of the Year'

Max Emanuel Cencic is extremely pleased to announce that the new production of the opera CARLO IL CALVO (by Nicola Antonio Porpora) staged by himself and performed at the Bayreuth Baroque Opera Festival 2020 has been voted the best new production of the year at the Forumopera Trophies 2020. Carlo il Calvo received 39.7% of the votes making it the ‘Nouvelle production de l'année‘.

The cast of the premiere of Carlo il Calvo:

Adalgiso: Franco Fagioli
Lottario: Max Emanuel Cencic
Gildippe: Julia Lezhneva
Giuditta: Suzanne Jerosme
Eduige: Nian Wang
Berardo: Bruno de Sá
Asprando: Petr Nekoranec

Musical direction: George Petrou
Orchestra: Armonia Atenea

Director: Max Emanuel Cencic
Stage design: Giorgina Germanou
Costumes: Maria Zorba
Lighting designer: David Debrinay
Dramaturgy: Boris Kehrmann
Assistant director: Constantina Psoma
Choreography: Dimitra Antonaki
Musical Assistant: Markellos Chryssicos

Orchestra: Sergiu Nastasa (Konzertmeister), Georgios Panagiotopoulos, Angeliki Kasda, Zoe Pouri, Ioannis Agraniotis, Filippos-Theodoros Matasaru, Carmen Otilia Alitsei, Athanasios Martzoukos, Angeliki Fanarioti, Luise Charlotte Ramos-Stahl, Laurentiu Octavian Matasaru, Eleftheria Togia, Iason Ioannou, Christopher Jarrett Humphrys, Dimitrios Tigkas , Dimitrios Vamvas, Styliani Nikolaidi, Sofia Siora, Spyridon Arkoudis, Daniele Bolzonella, Gabriele Rocchetti, Theodoros Kitsos, Markellos Chryssicos, Alexandros Ioannou                                     

Actors: Antonis Strouzas, Marianna Roussou, Eleni Tzortzi, Alvertos Kalogeropoulos, Nikolaos Pirokakos, Athina Chiliopoulou, Natalia Bozika, Antonio Karastergiou, Angelika-Zoe Karagkouni, Manuel Mora, Karolos Kalogeropoulos, Vassilis Voutekakis, Maksym Godorozha, Manos Papadas, Lena Cherouveim, Chryssa Pozidou, Domenica Regkou, Ioanna Zerva

Backstage: Marisa Soulioti, Clementine Pradier, Jeremie Lesage (Production Manager), Adrien Mastrosimone (Production Manager assistent), Christina Polychroniadou, Maria Kakaroglou, Tina Skodra, Dina Strani, Elisabeth Petrou, Sotiria Malatesta, Alex Koniaris, Thomas Marias

Max Emanuel Cencic thanks everyone who voted for Carlo il Calvo at Forum Opera and all the great colleagues on and behind the stage, without whom such a great production would never have come about.

Carlo il Calvo will come back to the Bayreuth Baroque Opera Festival on September 1st, 3rd and 5th, 2021.

Happy New Year!

Carlo il Calvo, broadcast on Mezzo TV

Critically acclaimed and celebrated by the audience, the new production of Carlo il Calvo, the opera by Nicola A. Porpora directed by Max Emanuel Cencic, which has been shown at the Bayreuth Baroque Opera Festival in this year, is being broadcast on Mezzo TV on the following dates:
12 December, 5 p.m.,
13 December, 9.30 a.m.,
18 December, 9 p.m.,
20 December, 2 a.m.

Further dates can be seen here.

The excellent cast of Carlo il Calvo includes:
 
Direction: Max Emanuel Cencic
Stage: Giorgina Germanou
Costumes: Maria Zorba
Lighting: David Debrinay
Dramaturgy: Dr. Boris Kehrmann
Assistant to the director: Constantina Psoma
Conductor: George Petrou
Orchestra: Armonia Atenea

Adalgiso: Franco Fagioli
Lottario: Max Emanuel Cencic
Gildippe: Julia Lezhneva
Giuditta: Suzanne Jerosme
Eduige: Nian Wang
Berardo: Bruno de Sá
Asprando: Petr Nekoranec
 
Carlo il Calvo is a production of the Bayreuth Baroque Opera Festival in cooperation with Parnassus Arts Productions. The staged performance will be shown again and recorded at the Bayreuth Baroque Opera Festival in 2021 with the same cast.
The cast of Carlo il Calvo Cast is looking forward to sharing this experience with you.