Written in 1843, O Rouxinol e o Imperador da China [The Emperor and the Nightingale], one of Hans Christian Andersen’s loveliest creations, tells the story of a small bird that so marvelled the old Emperor with his singing he had it caged, only to let it go a while later, having replaced it with a luxurious mechanical nightingale. One day, on his deathbed, he realises that only the beautiful music of the disregarded nightingale can save him from death… In O Rouxinol [The Nightingale], an opera that premiered at the Teatro Nacional de São Carlos in 2023, composer and librettist Sérgio Azevedo breathes new life into this beautiful allegory on freedom. A “miniature-opera” in four acts for three solo voices, mixed choir and symphonic orchestra, O Rouxinol brings us to a fantastical world, full of humour, lyricism and melancholy. This treat for listeners of all ages invites us to journey across such essential themes as life and death, true beauty and its fake copies, and human-animal relationships. “Go on, little nightingale, go on!”