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GIUDITTA. Lehar. Baden Baden Summer Festival 2025. A new production of Franz Lehár's final, passionate, melancholic, and melodious operetta, *Giuditta*, premiered at the Sommerarena Baden. Originally premiered at the Vienna State Opera in 1934, this work, brimming with exoticism, melancholy, and stirring melodies, tells a story of passion, longing, and unrequited love, and is renowned for classic arias such as "Meine Lippen, sie küssen so heiß" (My Lips, So Hot) and "Freunde, das Leben ist lebenswert" (Friends, Life Is So Beautiful). This production is directed by Michael Lakner, with Michael Zehetner serving as music director. The main singers include Ursula Pfitzner, Iurie Ciobanu, and Jakob Hoffmann. The Orchester der Bühne Baden and Chorus der Bühne Baden provide accompaniment. The story revolves around Judita (Ursula Pfitzner), an unhappy woman yearning for life. In a small port town in Spain, she unexpectedly meets Octavio (Yuri Ciobanu), a foreign legion soldier. She resolutely breaks free from the shackles of her marriage and follows him to North Africa—however, this beautiful dream of love is quickly shattered by reality: Octavio receives orders to return to the battlefield, leaving a disappointed Judita behind. Ultimately, when he chooses to desert the army out of longing for her, Judita's life has undergone a dramatic change. Octavio found Judith again, but it was too late to win her heart.
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