Offenbach Report

Paris, 1876. In his 40-year career Offenbach has had it all: the greatest successes and the worst failures. He also experienced the War of 1870, which brought opprobrium on this immigrant of German origin and reminded him that one is always a foreigner in one's adopted country. In order to pay off his debts, the man once dubbed "the mockingbird of the Second Empire" undertook a tour of the United States.

For the father of the operetta and beloved child of the Bouffes-Parisiens, this trip to the New World took on the character of an artistic introspection. Haunted by the ghosts of his life and work, Jakob Offenbach was led to reinvent himself, to undergo a transformation that would lead him, on his return, to conceive his ultimate masterpiece, Les Contes d'Hoffmann.

Born from the unprecedented association of the Operas of Nancy, Metz, Reims and Strasbourg, this outreach production offers everyone - young and old, novices and connoisseurs alike - an opportunity to embark on a lyrical journey through the work of a composer as brilliant as he is elusive.