How beautiful is this room at L'Arsenal in Metz, which hosted the 27th Victories of classical music on Friday evening! And how the 2020 list of this ceremony was up to the frame offered. Starting with the queen of the evening, Anna Netrebko who had made the trip to the Moselle to gratify spectators and viewers of France 3 with a too short extract of her talent. All dressed in white, the Austro-Russian soprano was Louise, the heroine of Gustave Charpentier, the time of Since the day all in sweetness. Obviously delighted with the welcome from the public - standing - and the Victory of Honor awarded to him, Netrebko was ready to offer a new air. But she heard behind the scenes a tenor warming up before entering the stage.
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Benjamin Bernheim is a phenomenon. At 34 years old, the Frenchman who grew up in Switzerland is a star that cinema directors tear themselves away from and put on their posters. In recent years, we have seen him making his debut in London, Vienna, Salzburg, Zürich, Milan ... In Paris, we discovered him in Capriccio by Strauss, Faust by Gounod and in a Rodolfo by La Bohème which marked the music lovers of the Bastille. It is this room that he finds on March 4 for a long-awaited new production of Manon by Jules Massenet, alongside Pretty Yende and Ludovic Tézier. Before coming back in July for La Bohème. But he is also playing at the Staatsoper in Vienna and next year he will make his debut at the Metropolitan Opera in Romeo and Juliet by Gounod.
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How, then, to decide between Benjamin Bernheim and the mezzo-soprano Karine Deshayes, already three times sacred? Liège has just saluted this beautiful confirmed artist and her interpretation of Rossini's La Cenerentola . In Paris, her Marguerite du Faust by Berlioz rocked the Philharmonie de Paris in January, which the people of Nice had the scoop for last year. At the end of March, she will be Sara in Roberto Devereux by Gaetano Donizetti at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées. Between Deshayes and Bernheim, the jury chose not to choose and reward these two talents by sharing the Victory of the lyric artist of the year. Soprano Elsa Dreisig, their youngest and third nominee, bowed gracefully.
Read also: Deshayes and Fagioli: promising "beginnings"
If the singers shared their trophy in two, a pianist left with two Victories. After its triumph at the Tchaikovsky Competition in 2019, France owed at least that to Alexandre Kantorow. Last year, in the revelation category, he had given way to Thibaut Garcia. This year, he won the recording victory for his concertos in Saint-Saëns (Bis) against Jodie Devos for Offenbach Colorature (Alpha) and the ensemble Les Siècles conducted by François-Xavier Roth (Harmonia Mundi). But he also erased Bertrand Chamayou (who acts as a 38-year-old veteran) and flautist Magali Mosnier in the category of instrumental artist of the year. At 22, Alexandre Kantorow has not finished surprising and seducing.
Read also: Alexandre Kantorow, winner of the Tchaikovsky competition: "It was a crazy experience"
Let us wish the revelations distinguished this year by the public, the soprano Marie Perbost and the oboist Gabriel Pidoux, as bright a future. Like the winner of the Composer's Victory of the Year, which returns, for the first time in the history of the ceremony to a woman: the Aménoise Camille Pépin, 29, whose catalog already knows some twenty works and who perfected his composition with two regulars from Victoires, Thierry Escaich and Guillaume Connesson.
Philippe Jaroussky was also very young when he was distinguished the first time. "Child of Victories", crowned in the revelation category 16 years ago and rewarded again four times since, the countertenor received a new Victory in Metz, this time of honor.
Very applauded, finally, the representative of the musicians of the National Orchestra of Metz. On behalf of his colleagues, he came to recall "the mobilization of artists" against the pension reform before the Minister of Culture Franck Riester. Lower retirement pensions for irregular careers, lower wages, heated negotiations ... And long applause to greet him while the musicians' representatives are rather whistled these last days when they explain their fight on stage.