How do you choose? On the one hand, the sensual love of Venus and the charms of her magical domain, the Venusberg. On the other, the Christian love of Elisabeth in the virtuous environment of the Wartburg and its poets. Having succumbed to the former, Tannhäuser will be redeemed, beyond death, by the second.

After Parsifal (2023) and Tristan and Isolde (2024), the Grand Théâtre de Genève continues its Wagnerian adventure while spinning the thread of grand opera. For Tannhäuser, the work of a 32-year-old Wagner – and already featuring his favourite themes of errancy and redemption through love – us brimming over with romanticism and the influence of Grand Opéra. In it, the individual confronts his aspirations as to the community in a miraculous balance between vocal stasis – from Tannhäuser’s ‘Hymn to Venus’ to Wolfram’s ‘Romance to the Star’, by way of Elisabeth’s grand entrance aria – and powerful chorus scenes: after The Huguenots (2020), La Juive (2022) and Don Carlos (2023), Tannhäuser represents a new operatic summit in the Grand Opéra genre for the Chœur du Grand Théâtre de Genève.