Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni
Libretto: Lorenzo Da Ponte
Mozart’s Don Giovanni ranks among the most magnificent works in the entire history of opera and remains one of the most intriguing scores in European music theatre, marked by a distinctly dark, ironic, and even tragic undertone. The opera, which the composer himself described as a dramma giocoso, already reveals at the level of genre its fundamental duality: on the one hand, it is permeated by comic, playful, and buffa elements; on the other, it constantly opens a space of moral, existential, and almost metaphysical terror, masterfully rendered through Mozart’s unfailing musical language.
The same applies to Da Ponte’s libretto, which draws on the rich European tradition of the Don Juan myth, yet surpasses it through an exceptionally precise dramatic structure and the psychological differentiation of its characters. Alongside the title figure, who is not merely a seducer and transgressor but almost a demonic embodiment of irrepressible energy, stands Leporello, at once his comic double and ironic commentator, while Donna Anna, Donna Elvira, and Zerlina each reveal, in her own way, different responses to Don Giovanni’s game of seduction and manipulation. A special place within the opera belongs to its musical dramaturgy: Don Giovanni is a figure of perpetual movement and provocation, until his world is shattered against the insurmountable boundary of the Commendatore’s statue. The final scene with the Stone Guest therefore remains one of the most powerful moments in operatic literature.
In the Maribor production, created under the direction of Edward Clug and the musical leadership of Simon Krečič, a new reading of this iconic opera is undoubtedly in prospect – an opera that to this day remains a challenge for every operatic ensemble and an inexhaustible source of interpretation.
Ondina Otta Klasinc Haal
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