When Eugene Onegin enters Tatyana's orderly life, he appears to her like a character from her novels. The young, inexperienced woman falls head over heels in love with the urbane bon vivant. But he rejects her affection; his restless lifestyle is not suitable for a long-term relationship. Years later, the two meet again. The mature Tatyana has entered into a marriage of convenience with the much older Prince Gremin and has become a wealthy woman. Onegin is shocked to realise that Tatyana would have been the right one for him after all. How will she respond to his passionate confessions… German director Michael Thalheimer stages his fourth production for Deutsche Oper am Rhein, creating a world of unfulfilled longings in a society that has grown tired of itself.

Katerina Ismailova is wealthily married and lonely, her husband impotent and her father-in-law a tyrant. She is trapped in a world where merciless brutality, despotism and cruelty reign. The woman with a lust for life and love gives way to her raw longing for freedom when a new labourer Sergei starts working for the Ismailov family. She throws herself into a passionate affair with him and poisons her father-in-law's food. But the increasing radicalism of her desire for self-determination will claim further victims...

Conductor Vitali Alekseenok pays tribute to the stifled uprising of the Belarusian people in 2020 and 2021. A concert presented at Ludwigsburg Castle, featuring works composed by young musicians from this country in crisis.