Spiced with Italian buffa, L’Heure espagnole transports us to Torquemada’s clock shop, the scene of his wife Concepcion’s infidelities.

L'Heure espagnole is a one-act operatic farce written by Ravel and first premiered in 1911. The title's literal translation is "The Spanish Hour", but here the word "heure" refers more generally to "time", reminiscent of the cliché, "How They Keep Time in Spain". The work's Latin atmosphere is reinforced through Ravel's incorporation of dance music like the malagueña, the jota, and the habañera.

A woman calls her ex-lover, unable to let go of him. She flatters, despairs and blackmails in the hope that he will not hang up the phone. / The clockmaker’s wife takes advantage of her husband’s absence to receive her lovers. In Opera Zuid's double bill of 20th century French masterpieces, everything revolves around the female protagonists and their emotional development. The one-act operas La Voix humaine (Francis Poulenc) and L'Heure espagnole (Maurice Ravel), each lasting less than an hour, present themselves as two sides of the same coin united by the same longing for connection to another human being.

Paella, tapas or tortillas: Spanish cuisine, which gives pride of place to vegetables and fresh produce, is a guest of choice at the French table.

Kazushi Ono and Laurent Pelly offer audiences an inspired and poetic interpretation of Ravel's classic children's opera, L'Enfant et les Sortilèges.