Jochen Schönleber

Jochen Schönleber, 3.6.1959 in Stuttgart, is a German opera and film director.

Her grew up in Tailfingen and Sindelfingen and started to write about theater for Die Deutsche Bühne, Stuttgarter Zeitung, FAZ Gruppe, New Grove Dictionary of Opera u.a. After early film work, humanities studies at the Eberhard Karls University in Tübingen and scholarships at the Istituto Italiano per gli Studi Filosofici in Naples, in 1985/86 he became an assistant to the exiled russian director Yuri Ljubimov at the State Opera Theaters in Stuttgart and Karlsruhe and to Beckett's collaborator Helfrid Foron in Tubingen 1986; in the same year he was the production manager at the Landeskunstwochen in Tübingen. From 1987 to 1993 he was responsible for the international concert ring and for chamber opera productions in Sindelfingen near Stuttgart. He also held the position of artistic director of the Theaterkeller. Since that time he has been active as a director in the field of spoken and musical theater.

ROSSINI IN WILDBAD

Schönleber has been artistic director of the Rossini Opera Festival in Bad Wildbad since 1992 and has developed the festival into a world-renowned experimental site for bel canto talents, works by Rossini, unknown works and the entire classical bel canto repertoire. He is intendant there since 2000. Since 2004 he has also been director of the Akademie BelCanto. He has produced numerous CDs and DVDs of the bel canto repertoire, especially for the classical label NAXOS.

Academie Bel Canto

Schönleber promoted numerous young bel canto talents, such as Pavol Breslik 2000, who became a soloist for a CD recording from the festival choir. The establishment of the BelCanto (ABC) Academy in Bad Wildbad in 2004 created the opportunity to promote numerous top young talents: In the initial project of the Academy, the young Joyce DiDonato sang Cenerentola under Alberto Zedda. The recording at NAXOS is still considered a reference recording. DiDonato, Zedda, Pratico, as well as Kurt Widmer, taught in this project, in which the Bavarian Theater Academy August Everding also took part with a group of young singers. Olga Peretyatko, Michael Spyres, Jessica Pratt, Diana Haller, Serena Saenz, Marina Viotti, Sara Blanch and many others, whose careers Schönleber promoted, took part in the academy. Most of these singers have been awarded the festival's International BelCanto Prize. Schönleber teaches at the BelCanto Academy and has given courses at the Opera Studio of the University of Alcalà and the Escuela de Canto superior in Madrid, at the Accademia del Maggio musicale Firenze, at the Academy Concertante Barcelona and at the Tongji University, Shanghai.

Stage productions

Schönleber began working as a director with experimental short films in 1976. His first collaborators switched to the later Hollywood director and producer Roland Emmerich, an older classmate. The German director Markus Dietz was also active as an actor in the school theater group. Under the patronage of the playwright Samuel Beckett, Schönleber played Lucky in Waiting for Godot (in german).

His professional production list includes Kassandra (1988), Weisse Rose (1989), Maria Stuart (1990), Krapp’s last tape 1994 among others. As part of the Rossini Festival in Wildbad Edipo a Colono (1992), Di Himmlische Hochzeit /Le Nozze di Teti e di Peleo (1994), Sigismondo (1995, 2016), Eduardo e Cristina (1997), L'accademia di musica (2003 ), Semiramide (Modern première Meyerbeer 2005), Mosè in Egitto (2006), Il signor Bruschino (2009, 2023), La Cenerentola (2010), Il turco in Italia (2011), I briganti (Modern première, Mercadante 2012) and the first complete performance of Rossini's Monumental work Guillaume Tell (2013). Il viaggio a Reims (2014), L'inganno felice (2015), Maometto secondo (2017), L'occasione fa il ladro (2017) Moise (2018), L'equivoco stravagante (2018), Tancredi (2019), I tre gobbi (Modern première, Garcià 2019,2021), L 'isola disabitata (Garcia, 2020), Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra (1999/2021), Ermione (2022), Adina (2022), Monsieur Offenbach chez Rossini (Offenbach/Rossini 2022), Il barbiere di Siviglia (2023).
Elsewhere: Le cinesi (Garcia; Barcelona 2015, Firenze 2016), Il conte di Marsico (Balducci; Barcelona 2016), Il cacciatore deluso (Jommelli, Tübingen, Moderne EA 2017) L'equivoco stravagante (Russian 2018), Tancredi ( Kraków 2019), Elisabetta (Kraków 2021),

Media

The first DVD Guillaume Tell (Bongiovanni 2015) was awarded Editor's Choice by Opera News (NY). L'inganno felice (Dynamics 2016) was awarded Critic's Choice in Opera News. L'occasione fa il ladro (Naxos 2019). Il cacciatore deluso (Jommelli. Arsenal film distribution 2021). L'equivoco stravagante (Naxos 2021) was streamed live and the recording was nominated for the ICMA. L’isola disabitata was streamed on World Opera Day 2022. Il signor Bruschino is in streaming on the European platform OperaVision in 2023/24. Several new DVD releases are in preparation.

1 Tell DVD Opera News New York 3/2017

1 Inganno DVD Opera News New York 9/2015

1 https://www.icma-info.com/icma-jury-nominates-377-releases-for-the-2022-awards/

I am desperately looking for the interview of Spyres with an english journal, where he refers on me as the person that helped him to become a barytenore and where he talks about the „madman“ in Wildbad....

https://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Hubert_Bartholomae&action=edit&redlink=1

Jochen Schönleber, 3.6.1959 in Stuttgart, is a German opera and film director.

Her grew up in Tailfingen and Sindelfingen and started to write about theater for Die Deutsche Bühne, Stuttgarter Zeitung, FAZ Gruppe, New Grove Dictionary of Opera u.a. After early film work, humanities studies at the Eberhard Karls University in Tübingen and scholarships at the Istituto Italiano per gli Studi Filosofici in Naples, in 1985/86 he became an assistant to the exiled russian director Yuri Ljubimov at the State Opera Theaters in Stuttgart and Karlsruhe and to Beckett's collaborator Helfrid Foron in Tubingen 1986; in the same year he was the production manager at the Landeskunstwochen in Tübingen. From 1987 to 1993 he was responsible for the international concert ring and for chamber opera productions in Sindelfingen near Stuttgart. He also held the position of artistic director of the Theaterkeller. Since that time he has been active as a director in the field of spoken and musical theater.