La clemenza di Tito

Marc Minkowski ist künstlerischer Leiter von Les Musiciens du Louvre und des Festivals Ré Majeure. Von 2016 bis Januar 2022 leitete er die Opéra National de Bordeaux und war von 2013 bis 2017 künstlerischer Leiter der Mozartwoche Salzburg. Ausserdem war er von 2018 bis 2022 künstlerischer Berater des Kanazawa Orchesters (Japan). Im Alter von 19 Jahren gründete er Les Musiciens du Louvre, ein Ensemble, das sich aktiv der Wiederbelebung der Barockmusik widmete und mit dem er neben dem französischen Repertoire auch Händel erarbeitete, bevor er sich Mozart, Rossini, Offenbach und Wagner zuwandte. Er ist regelmässiger Gast an den Pariser Bühnen ebenso an der Opéra National de Bordeaux. Weitere Gastengagements führten ihn u.a. nach Salzburg, Genf, Zürich (Il trionfo del tempo e del disinganno, Giulio Cesare, Agrippina, Les Boréades, Fidelio, La Favorite), Berlin, Amsterdam, Theater an der Wien, Wiener Staatsoper, Aix-en-Provence, Londoner Covent Garden sowie an die Mailänder Scala. Dabei arbeitete er u.a. mit Regisseuren wie Laurent Pelly, Olivier Py, Dmitri Tcherniakov, Bob Wilson, Krzysztof Warlikowski, Bartabas, Klaus Michael Grüber und Vincent Huguet. Marc Minkowski wird für Programme mit klassischem und modernem Repertoire auch regelmässig von den wichtigsten Sinfonieorchestern eingeladen, darunter die Staatskapelle Dresden, Berliner Philharmoniker, Mozarteum Orchester Salzburg, Wiener Philharmoniker, Wiener Symphoniker, Bamberger Symphoniker, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart (SWR), Staatskapelle Berlin oder Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino.

Damiano Michieletto studied opera and theatre direction in Milan and literature at the University of his hometown, Venice. In 2003, he won the ESB Theatre Award of the Irish Times at the Wexford Festival for his production of Jaromír Weinberger’s opera "Schwanda the Bagpiper." This was followed by productions for the Rossini Festival in Pesaro, the Teatro Olimpico in Vicenza, and for opera houses in Bologna, Verona, Venice, Naples, Turin, Graz, Geneva, and Leipzig. He directed "Così fan tutte" for the New National Theatre in Tokyo, "Il trittico" and "Idomeneo" for the Theater an der Wien, and at the Zurich Opera House "La scala di seta," "Il corsaro," "Lucia di Lammermoor," "Luisa Miller," and "Poliuto." In 2012, he made his debut at the Salzburg Festival with "La bohème," followed by productions of "Falstaff" and "La Cenerentola." Further engagements have taken him to the Staatsoper Unter den Linden in Berlin, the Paris Opera, the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, the Teatro Real in Madrid, the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, and the Glyndebourne Festival. In 2022, he created the immersive installation "Archèus. Labirinto Mozart" for the Venice Biennale. His most recent works include "Messiah" at the Komische Oper Berlin, "La fille du régiment" at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, and the world premiere of Francesco Filidei’s "Il nome della rosa" at La Scala in Milan. In addition to his work as an opera director, Damiano Michieletto is also active in theatre, particularly at the Teatro Stabile del Veneto and the Piccolo Teatro in Milan. He recently released his first film, "Primavera," inspired by Tiziano Scarpa’s novel "Stabat Mater."

Paolo Fantin was born in Castelfranco, Italy, and studied set design at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Venice. He has a close artistic partnership with director Damiano Michieletto, with whom he became a finalist at the Graz Ring Award in 2005 for "Le nozze di Figaro." Their collaborations have since included Britten’s children’s opera "The Little Sweep" in Sicily, "Don Giovanni," "Le nozze di Figaro," and "Così fan tutte" at Teatro La Fenice in Venice, "La bohème" in Salzburg and Shanghai, Puccini’s "Il trittico" in Vienna and Copenhagen, "L’elisir d’amore" in Madrid and Graz, "Un ballo in maschera" and "La scala di seta" in Milan, as well as theatrical productions such as Gogol’s "The Government Inspector" in Italy and "The Threepenny Opera" at the Theater an der Wien. In 2011, together with Carla Teti, he received the prestigious Premio Franco Abbiati for set and costume design for "Sigismondo," "Don Giovanni," and "Madama Butterfly." In 2012, Paolo Fantin made his Salzburg Festival debut with Michieletto’s production of "La bohème," followed by "Falstaff" and "La Cenerentola." Further collaborations include "Idomeneo" at the Theater an der Wien and in Tokyo, "The Rake’s Progress" in Leipzig and Venice, "Samson et Dalila" and "Don Pasquale" in Paris, "Roméo et Juliette" and a Mozart/Da Ponte cycle at La Fenice, Martinů’s "The Greek Passion" in Palermo, "Guillaume Tell" at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, "La damnation de Faust" in Rome, "Oedipus Rex" at the Frankfurt Opera, "Animal Farm" at Dutch National Opera, and "Madama Butterfly" at Teatro Regio in Turin. At the Zurich Opera House, his designs have been seen in "Lucia di Lammermoor," "Il corsaro," "Luisa Miller," "Poliuto," and "La scala di seta."

Klaus Bruns studied stage and costume design at the Mozarteum in Salzburg. For almost 30 years, he has worked as a costume designer at theatres including those in Stuttgart, Graz, Frankfurt, Zurich, Cologne, and Leipzig, as well as at the Burgtheater in Vienna, the Thalia Theater Hamburg, the Schaubühne and Deutsches Theater Berlin, and the Residenztheater and Kammerspiele in Munich. He has a long-standing collaboration with Karin Henkel. In opera, he has worked with Barrie Kosky, Michael Talke, Andreas Homoki, Olivier Tambosi, Michael Schulz, Harry Kupfer, Götz Friedrich, and Christof Loy, among others, at the three Berlin opera houses, the Nuremberg Opera, Vlaamse Opera Antwerp, the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, the Leipzig Opera, Teatro Regio Turin, Theater an der Wien, the National Theatres in Mannheim and Weimar, the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro, and Dutch National Opera in Amsterdam. His collaborations with Barrie Kosky include "Der Ring des Nibelungen" at the Hanover State Opera; "Rusalka," "Moses und Aron," "Eugene Onegin," "Anatevka," and "The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny" at the Komische Oper Berlin; "La fanciulla del West," "Macbeth," "Die Gezeichneten," "Eugene Onegin," "Boris Godunov," and "Manon Lescaut" at the Zurich Opera House; "Prince Igor" at the Opéra Bastille in Paris; "Fiddler on the Roof" at the Lyric Opera of Chicago; and "Agrippina" at the Hamburg State Opera. For the costumes in Kosky’s Bayreuth production of "Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg," Klaus Bruns was named "Costume Designer of the Year" by Opernwelt magazine in 2018. In 2024, he received the Oper! Award for Best Costume Designer for the world premiere of Alexander Raskatov’s "Animal Farm" in Amsterdam.

Ernst Raffelsberger comes from Gmunden, Upper Austria. He studied music education and church music at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna, as well as choral conducting at the Mozarteum Salzburg. From 1983 to 1986, he was Kapellmeister of the Vienna Boys’ Choir. During this time, he conducted the ensemble in Vienna and on tours through Europe, South Africa, Canada, and the USA. From 1986, Ernst Raffelsberger was choral director and Kapellmeister at the Landestheater Salzburg (participating in the Salzburg Mozart Week and the Salzburg Festival). In 1989, he moved as choral director and Kapellmeister to the Theater in Freiburg/Breisgau. Since autumn 1993, Ernst Raffelsberger has been engaged as choral director at the Zurich Opera House. Here, he has overseen approximately 150 premieres and countless revivals and has collaborated with many renowned conductors such as Marco Armiliato, Riccardo Chailly, Teodor Currentzis, Christoph von Dohnányi, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Daniele Gatti, Bernard Haitink, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Zubin Mehta, Gianandrea Noseda, and Franz Welser-Möst. Guest performances with the Zurich Opera House have taken him to Vienna, London, Paris, and Tokyo. From the summer of 2012, he also began a 10-year tenure as choral director of the Vienna State Opera Chorus for the Salzburg Festival. This led to successful collaborations with Riccardo Muti, Mariss Jansons, and Sir Simon Rattle, among others. After Ernst Raffelsberger concluded this work with the 2021 festival season, he has, since 2025, been responsible once again, at Maestro Muti’s request, for choral preparation for his festival concerts in Salzburg. Numerous CD and DVD recordings document his work in both Zurich and Salzburg.

Kathrin Brunner was born in Zurich. She studied German, Musicology, and French in her hometown and at the Humboldt University in Berlin. After various assistant directorships (including "The Threepenny Opera" at the Lucerne Theater, directed by Vera Nemirova) and dramaturgy internships, she has been a dramaturge at the Zurich Opera House since 2008. There, she has worked with directors such as Achim Freyer ("Moses und Aron"), Harry Kupfer ("Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg", "Tannhäuser"), Stephan Müller, Guy Joosten, Damiano Michieletto, Christof Loy ("La straniera", "Alcina", "I Capuleti e i Montecchi", "Don Pasquale", "La rondine"), Willy Decker ("Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria", "The Turn of the Screw"), Andreas Homoki ("Wozzeck", "Das Land des Lächelns", "La forza del destino"), Christoph Marthaler ("Il viaggio a Reims", "Orphée et Euridice"), Barrie Kosky ("Die Gezeichneten", "Boris Godunov"), Nadja Loschky, Nina Russi, Jan Essinger, and Jetske Mijnssen ("Idomeneo", "Hippolyte et Aricie", "Platée").
At the 2012 Salzburg Festival, she worked on "La bohème" with Damiano Michieletto. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she co-founded the concert series "Altchemie live" at the Alte Chemie in Uetikon. In 2025, she served as dramaturge for Jetske Mijnssen’s production of Francesco Cavalli’s "La Calisto" at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence.