An Introduction to the Royal Opera 2002/03 Season by Antonio Pappano, Music Director of the Royal Opera ...A new beginning, a golden opportunity. Welcome to our 2002/03 season. The Royal Opera offers a richly varied programme for this Season and I am happy indeed that my appointment happened long enough ago for me to have been involved in its planning. Some projects of course have been in the pipe-line for a number of years - not least the world premiere of Nicholas Maw's opera Sophie's Choice, a title already well known from the novel and film. A terrific team of Status: O enough ago for me to have been involved in its planning. Some projects of course have been in the pipe-line for a number of years - not least the world premiere of Nicholas Maw's opera Sophie's Choice, a title already well known from the novel and film. A terrific team of artists will create this December premiere, lead by Simon Rattle and Trevor Nunn, with huge singing talents like Angelika Kirchschlager and Rodney Gilfry in the cast. My personal choices to conduct in my first Season as Music Director of course tell you something about my own taste; new productions of Strauss' Ariadne auf Naxos, Berg's Wozzeck, Puccini's Madama Butterfly, Leoncavallo's Pagliacci and a revival of Verdi's Falstaff, all musical and theatrical masterpieces I love. Working on new productions together with the creative teams is, for me, a most important and thrilling process. Both Christof Loy (directing Ariadne) and Keith Warner (Wozzeck) have been regular collaborators of mine in Brussels and elsewhere, and I became a fan of Patrice Caurier and Moshe Leiser when I saw their new La Cenerentola here last year. They will direct the new Madama Butterfly, as well as reviving La Cenerentola and staging their Geneva production of Ambroise Thomas' Hamlet. Pagliacci is a special indulgence - a production by one of the true masters, Franco Zeffirelli, mounted to bring together some spectacular talents - Placido Domingo, Angela Gheorghiu and Dmitri Hvorostovsky to end the Season. Other new productions include Verdi's Luisa Miller and Mozart's Die Zauberflote, directed by two of last season's successful debutantes, Olivier Tambosi (who directed Jenufa) and David McVicar (whose Rigoletto is also back for its first revival); La clemenza di Tito, directed by Stephen Lawless; and Verdi's I masnadieri in Elijah Moshinsky's production reaches the stage of the Royal Opera House for the first time. It is an honour after taking up the baton of The Royal Opera from my great predecessor Bernard Haitink to be sharing this first season with many major figures of the conducting world: Colin Davis conducts Die Zauberflote and La clemenza di Tito; Charles Mackerras Semele and concerts of Rusalka; Edward Downes conducts I masnadieri; John Eliot Gardiner The Cunning Little Vixen, and Mark Elder Lohengrin - and apart from this illustrious group of British-based artists, Christoph von Dohnanyi returns to conduct Strauss' Elektra. I am very happy to have some of the newer conductor talents making their debuts with us in my first Season, such as Mark Wigglesworth with Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg, Louis Langree, Hamlet, Paolo Carignani, La traviata and Philippe Jordan, Die Zauberflote. And in addition a group of Italian conductors return to The Royal Opera - Maurizio Benini for Rigoletto and Luisa Miller, Gianluigi Gelmetti for Turandot and Evelino Pido for La Cenerentola. A dazzling array of singers are on display; Bryn Terfel is back as Falstaff, Renee Fleming sings Rusalka in concert and the long list of favourites includes Thomas Allen, Amanda Roocroft, Juan Diego Florez, Bruce Ford, Simon Keenlyside, Waltraud Meier and many, many more - but there are also some long awaited house debuts, like Natalie Dessay as Zerbinetta and Ophelia, Dawn Upshaw as the Vixen, Matthias Goerne as Wozzeck and some exciting newcomers to look forward to, among them Patricia Ciofi as Gilda and Diana Damrau as Queen of Night. I'm very proud of our Vilar Young Artists Programme which will this Season contain ten singers, a conductor, director and repetiteur, whose presence will be increasingly obvious in main-stage casting, their summer concert and their activities in the Linbury Studio Theatre. A new opera by John Browne b ased on Babette's Feast featuring many of them will be the first commissioned opera for the Linbury Studio Theatre in November. Janos Gereben/SF [log in to unmask]