Éric Vigié

Éric Vigié first studied at the National Music Conservatoire of Nice and decided to get involved into operatic stage direction in 1981, starting by attending master classes with Boris Goldovsky, at the Southeastern Massachusetts University. He became the second assistant of Gian Carlo Menotti at the Spoleto Festival and Paris Opera. After being granted a scholarship from the French Ministry of Culture in 1982–1984 to study lyric stage direction, he was engaged at the Nice Opera, from 1983 to 1993, as assistant and stage director. He worked with some world-famous stage directors, whose productions he reset in many theatres and festivals in Europe and in the USA, as well as Margarete Wallmann, Pier Luigi Pizzi, Daniel Mesguich, Georges Lavaudant, Jean-Pierre Ponnelle, Jorge Lavelli, Nicolas Joël, Giancarlo del Monaco, Lotfi Mansouri, Goran Jävefel, and Pet Halmen who also trained him to set and costume design. From 1986 to 1990, he was assistant at the Aix-en-Provence Festival. Since 1991, he directed many productions, in France and abroad: at the Nice Opera, he directed Mozart’s Così fan tutte, Pergolesi’s La serva padrona, Rossini’s Otello; he directed and designed the sets and costumes for Mozart’s Ascanio in Alba, Vivaldi’s Dorilla in Tempe, Handel’s Poro, re delle Indie. At the Paris Comic Opera, he directed, in 1995, Nicolai’s Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor, Rossini’s Le comte Ory and La serva padrona with the l’Île-de-France Opera and the Nice Baroque Ensemble. Éric Vigié also directed Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte at the Strasbourg Festival, the Toulouse Capitole Theatre, and the Santiago Municipal Theater; Delibes’s Lakmé in the city of Limoges; Puccini’s La Bohème and Tosca in Rouen, Dublin, and at the Opera Zuid in Holland; Verdi’s Rigoletto in Dublin; Poulenc’s La voix humaine and Landowski’s Les adieux at La Filature in Mulhouse; Così fan tutte for the French Chamber Opera; Haydn’s L’isola disabitata and La canterina at the Périgord Noir Festival; Bizet’s Carmen, under the baton of Valery Guergiev (1996), at the Mariinsky Theatre and during a Japan tour. In 2000, he brought back to light Melchior Gomis’ operatic fantasy Le Revenant at the Zarzuela Theatre, coproduced with the Toulouse Capitole Theatre. After that, he directed Manon at the Bern Opera; Varney’s Les mousquetaires au couvent at the Nice Opera, coproduced with the Toulouse Capitole Theatre; a new production of Donizetti’s Rita and the show for the 150th anniversary of the theatre, at the Madrid Royal Theatre, under the baton of Plácido Domingo. He was invited by the Colón Theatre to direct Verdi’s I vespri siciliani and La traviata. During these last years, he was entrusted three new productions of Verdi’s operas by the Santiago Municipal Theater: Il trovatore, Nabucco, and Un ballo in maschera. In 1997–2002, Éric Vigié was the artistic administrator of the Madrid Royal Theatre. From 2002 to 2004, he was the first foreigner being the artistic director of one of the twelve national Italian theatres: Verdi Theatre in Trieste. Since July 2004, he is the general director of the Lausanne Opera. He created, in 2010, the touring company La Route Lyrique in order to bring a good quality lyric performance to the little cities that have never had the opportunity to present a show of this kind. Éric Vigié is also the artistic director of the Avenches Opera Festival since 2010, where he directed La bohème, Carmen and Puccini’s Madama Butterfly. At the Lausanne Opera, he directed the productions of l’EnVol, a group of young singers: Rita (2005), Menotti’s Le telephone and Amelia al ballo (2006), and La Bohème (2008).