Orfeo ed Euridice is a lyric opera composed by Christoph Willibald Gluck based on a libretto by Ranieri de’ Calzabigi, his 30th and most famous production. The success of this drama lies in the vigor of its plot, an innovation that would continue in Alceste, as well as in Paride ed Elena. In fact, Gluck proposed to simplify the dramatic action and the obscure phrasing, as well as the vocal virtuosity of the opera seria and in Orfeo ed Euridice, he implements what is now termed “Gluck’s reform,” which would later influence composers including Berlioz and Wagner. Gluck’s opera takes up the myth of Orpheus—a singer par excellence—who convinces the gods to resurrect his lover Eurydice with a moving lamentation. But a single glance leads him to lose everything... Orfeo ed Euridice provided one of the most famous arias of the lyric repertoire (“Che farò senza Euridice”), as well as some of the most memorable choral masterpieces.
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medici.tv is the best online platform for streaming Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice live, on replay or VOD, offering you a virtual ticket to the most exciting concerts with the world’s best artists and orchestras captured in HD video. The story of Orpheus was a great source of inspiration for many artists throughout history (including Monteverdi, who composed L’Orfeo), but the novelty of Gluck’s tragic opera lies in bringing back the simplicity of ancient Greek plots, as well as their compositional balance. The symbolism evoked by Orpheus was not Gluck’s original creation: the character of Orpheus forms the basis of an esoteric cult which takes his name, Orphism. Come and discover this famous character in C. W. Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice!
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In his essay L’Espace littéraire (“The Space of Literature”), Maurice Blanchot dedicated a significant chapter to the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, a conceptual core of his text. By means of an allusive argumentation, Blanchot argues that this myth represents the essence of artistic creation, a process that never leaves the writer satisfied. In fact, the French philosopher interprets the gesture of Orpheus, who turns to his lover at the exit of Hell, as the impossibility of an author to reach his muse. Returning to Gluck, one might wonder how Blanchot would have read the narrative variant staged in Orfeo ed Euridice: in this opera, the intervention of a deus ex machina saves the two lovers from death… And yet, Gluck’s incessant rewriting of Orfeo ed Euridice (who signed at least four versions of his work) seems to support Blanchot’s interpretation! Come and discover Gluck’s opera on medici.tv!