Performance History
The opera was first performed on 26 September 1915 in the Hofoper in Stuttgart, with the composer conducting. In the same year it was also performed in Vienna (with Maria Jeritza in the title role), Berlin (Richard Strauss conducting the first two performances), Breslau, Hamburg and Budapest.
The North American premiere took place at the Metropolitan Opera in New York on 1 March 1923, Artur Bodanzky conducting, with Barbara Kemp, Michael Bohnen (both making their Met debut) and Curt Taucher in the principal roles.
Post war revivals at the Städtische Oper Berlin in 1953 and at the Badischen Staatstheater in Karlsruhe in 1983 were cut in length. It was revived complete at the Kiel Opera House in November 1994 and subsequently performed at the Wiener Volksoper in 1996.
Read more about this topic: Mona Lisa (opera)
Famous quotes containing the words performance and/or history:
“They say all lovers swear more performance than they are able, and yet reserve an ability that they never perform; vowing more than the perfection of ten, and discharging less than the tenth part of one.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“The greatest horrors in the history of mankind are not due to the ambition of the Napoleons or the vengeance of the Agamemnons, but to the doctrinaire philosophers. The theories of the sentimentalist Rousseau inspired the integrity of the passionless Robespierre. The cold-blooded calculations of Karl Marx led to the judicial and business-like operations of the Cheka.”
—Aleister Crowley (1875–1947)