Chris Merritt

In an imaginary American city, God consigns its licentious citizens to hell but they truculently reply that they are already there. Mahagonny ‘the city of nets’ is founded in the desert by three criminals on the run from the police. It is to be a city devoted to pleasure. The only god is money. So Jimmy Mahoney, the hedonistic lumberjack, is condemned to death for being unable to pay the bill for the whisky he has consumed. A testament to the fertile but fraught collaboration between composer Kurt Weill and man of theatre Bertolt Brecht, Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny is one of the great operas of the 20th century. Brecht might have resented the dominance of the music over the words but together they created a work with rich melody and unstoppable dramatic momentum.

Puccini’s last opera is all about riddles. The Emperor of China rules over the Forbidden City of Peking. His unmarried daughter, the Princess Turandot, has refused her hand to all her princely suitors by putting them to a test. She sets them three riddles; if they do not answer them correctly, they will lose their heads. As unlucky suitors fail and fall, up steps Calaf, a prince of the Tatar people. Daniel Kramer’s new staging in Geneva transposes the old fairy tale to a futuristic world where Turandot’s magic holds sway. In a dystopian game show, reminiscent of Hunger Games, the Princess presides over a surveillance state in which men are culled and the reproduction of the human race is conducted in breeding labs.

Live from La Scala Wednesday 14 December 1988.

Live from La Scala Jan. 2 1990

Based on a narrative poem by Sir Walter Scott and set against the backdrop of feudal Scotland, "La Donna del Lago" is one of Gioacchini Rossini's finest operas -- yet it's rarely performed. This video gives viewers a rare opportunity to see the work in its entirety. Filmed at Italy's famed Teatro alla Scala in 1992 and staged by German film director Werner Herzog, the opera features vocalists Ricardo Muti and June Anderson in leading roles.

Premiered in Stockholm in 1978, the work is based on a play by Michel de Ghelderode (1898-1962) and unfolds in an imaginary land inspired by the famous Dutch painter Pieter Brueghel the Elder: Nekrotzar, the Grand Macabre, announces the end of the world; but in a land ruled by eros, alcohol and corruption, his plan to unleash the Apocalypse bursts like a soap bubble. LIVE RECORDING FROM THE GRAN TEATRE DEL LICEU, BARCELONA, 2011

La cruelle Princesse Turandot offre sa main au prince qui saura résoudre trois énigmes, les concourants défaits étant livrés au bourreau et mis à mort. Malgré le nombre immense de princes ayant perdu la vie dans ce concours, le Prince Calaf, fou amoureux de la Princesse, décide de tenter sa chance.

Le monde est à vous est une émission télévisée de divertissement conçue et présentée par Jacques Martin entre 1987 à 1997 sur la chaine Antenne 2 (devenue France 2 en 1992). Elle succédait à l'émission Tout le Monde le sait (1985-1986) dans la tranche Dimanche Martin. Il y avait trois candidats qui devaient répondre à des questions sur des sujets multiples: celui qui enregistrait le plus de points décrochait le voyage de son choix. Il y avait tous types de variété, chanson française, internationale mais également de la musique classique. Et assez fréquemment Jacques Martin interprétait une chanson qui rappelait l'époque de sa jeunesse (il avait 55 ans en 1988). Cette émission a été remplacée en septembre 1997 par Sous vos applaudissements.