Translations:Bij De Munt is online opera al jaren een nieuwe werkelijkheid/15/en

As with all digital productions, it’s important to clear the rights when publishing an opera online, and Nicolaï knows all about this. ‘La Monnaie is an opera production house. The creative team, such as the opera director and the light designer, are under contract with us, and these contracts state that we can only stream productions on a limited basis. Music publishers also have a part to play here. Even though Mozart lived 220 years ago, publishers still retain the rights to his works even today. So we need to renegotiate for every production, performance and streaming. Negotiating about Wagner is very complex, for example, and the performances themselves, and streaming them, are expensive.’ It’s difficult to provide exact amounts for streaming. ‘The costs differ from an amount per stream to a full purchase, and can vary from anything between €1k and €20k.’