Omer Meir Wellber to receive the Rudi Haussler Prize as Part of the Mozart Days 2022

With its Mozart Days 2022, the Semperoper is celebrating Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Da Ponte operas with a diverse programme of events over the Easter weekend. Under the baton of Omer Meir Wellber, Principal Guest Conductor of the Semperoper Dresden, the three operas Don Giovanni, Le nozze di Figaro, and Così fan tutte will be performed as part of a special programme exploring the Mozart-Da Ponte partnership.

Wellber has already thrilled Dresden audiences with his interpretations of Mozart operas, in particular at the Semperoper's Mozart Days of 2016/17, as well as his outstanding performances on the harpsichord, fortepiano or accordion. The Israeli artist's personal experiences and growing affection for Mozart's music have even found their way into the books of the world-renowned conductor, whose interpretation of Madama Butterfly in the new Semperoper production has been warmly praised by critics.

Not only Mozart fans will enjoy the performances at the Mozart Days 2022 by the Staatskapelle and a brilliant roster of singers, some of whom will be making their house and/or role debuts in the coming season. For example, bass-baritone Erwin Schrott will appear for the first time in the Semperoper's operatic programme.

The festival programme will feature a Matinee entitled The man at my side - the adventurous life of Lorenzo Da Ponte with arias and ensembles from operas by Mozart's contemporaries Antonio Salieri and Vicente Martín y Soler using texts by Lorenzo Da Ponte. The concert will be performed by members of the Semperoper ensemble. And our theoretical knowledge of the successful writing team Mozart/Da Ponte will be deepened by a lecture given by the Director of the Musicological Institute of Zurich University, Prof. Laurenz Lütteken, on Enlightenment in Vienna. Mozart, Da Ponte and their times as well as a symposium with Omer Meir Wellber, Semperoper ensemble member Lawson Anderson and the cultural editor of the Münchner Abendzeitung, Robert Braunmüller.

At the performance of Don Giovanni on 15 April 2022, Omer Meir Wellber - who continues to hold the title of Principal Guest Conductor of the Semperoper until the end of the 2021/22 season - will be awarded the Semperoper Foundation Prize in recognition of his artistic achievements and his close ties to Dresden's opera house.

In 2020, the Semperoper Foundation honoured the artist with its annual Rudi Häussler Prize, which is endowed with 10,000 euros. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, however, the award ceremony could not take place as planned during the opera gala. The Foundation, under its chairman, Prof. Rüdiger Grube, will now use the Semperoper's Mozart Days 2022 as a suitable occasion to present this accolade to Omer Meir Wellber.