A king listens: its subtitle identifies Un Re in ascolto, this special combination of music and drama, as a "musical action by Luciano Berio and Italo Calvino". A dialogue between composer and writer, between different forms of theater – and also, if you like, between Shakespeare and Thomas Bernhard. And, indeed, he is a "Theatermacher", an impresario, this Prospero (Theo Adam), who is accompanied by the director (Heinz Zednik) and the actor "Friday" (Helmut Lohner) and to whom a musical and scenic performance of truly magical dimensions is presented. The score is characterized as much by Berio's partiality for solos and the musical dialogue between the instruments and the various groups, as by the frequently exposed use of the singing voices. But, of course, the voices and the orchestra parts are also engaged in a continuous dialogue, often slowly intertwining only to suddenly break up again. An opera, all in all, composed for the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, an excellent ensemble of singers, for Lorin Maazel, for the Salzburg Festival.