Teodor Currentzis becomes the head of the Perm State Opera and Ballet Theatre. The core line-up of musicAeterna and New Siberian Singers moves from Novosibirsk to Perm together with him. For the following eight years, Perm becomes the ensemble’s home.
MusicAeterna’s first performance in Perm (where the musicians play two of Mozart’s symphonies) happens on February 10. After that, the ensemble goes on tour to Amsterdam and Vienna.
In September, the stage of the Perm Opera welcomes the first premiere directed by Teodor Currentzis with participation from musicAeterna: Matthias Remus’s version of Mozart’s “Cosi fan tutte” opera which gives a start to the big “Mozart – Da Ponte Trilogy in Perm” project and spawns the “Perm Mozart” phenomenon.
In late October, the team of Teodor Currentzis, Barbara Hannigan and musicAeterna triumphantly performs at concert halls of the three Russian capitals. The programme of the “Rameau-Gala: Perm — Moscow — Saint Petersburg” tour is fully dedicated to the works of the great French baroque composer.
In November, Teodor Currentzis and choirmaster Vitaliy Polonskiy present a new troupe: the musicAeterna chamber choir, which is comprised at its core from members of New Siberian Singers. The initial line-up features 16 people; by the start of the next season, this number will have grown to 40.
December witnesses the premiere of the “Towards Diaghilev” choreography night. The project includes two lesser-known ballets by George Balanchine along with two new productions by the theatre’s chief balletmaster Alexey Miroshnichenko. One of the new pieces — Prokofiev’s “Chout” — features exact copies of decorations designed by avant garde artist Mikhail Larionov, which were commissioned by Sergei Diaghilev in 1921. Teodor Currentzis is the music director and conductor of the project.