Heart Chamber (opera)

Last updated

Heart Chamber is an English-language opera in two acts by Chaya Czernowin to a libretto by the composer, and which premiered at 15 November 2019 at the Deutsche Oper Berlin. [1] It has also been described as music theater. [2] The opera is scored for 5 vocalists, 5 instrumental soloists, choir, orchestra, and electronics.

Contents

Performance history

Heart Chamber premiered on 15 November 2019 in at the Deutsche Oper Berlin. The production was directed by Claus Guth and conducted by Johannes Kalitzke. The cast included Patrizia Ciofi, Dietrich Henschel, Noa Frenkel, and Terry Way. [3]

Due to the work's musical style, which requires quiet singing and vocalizations, all the singers in the production were amplified. [2]

Roles

Role Voice type Premiere Cast
She Soprano [4] Patrizia Ciofi [3]
Her Internal Voice Mezzo-Soprano [4] Noa Frenkel [3]
He Baritone [4] Dietrich Henschel [3]
His Internal VoiceCountertenor [4] Terry Wey [3]

Recording

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Franz Schreker</span> Austrian composer

Franz Schreker was an Austrian composer, conductor, teacher and administrator. Primarily a composer of operas, Schreker developed a style characterized by aesthetic plurality, timbral experimentation, strategies of extended tonality and conception of total music theatre into the narrative of 20th-century music.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rolando Villazón</span> Mexican tenor (born 1972)

Rolando Villazón Mauleón is a Mexican operatic tenor, stage director, author, radio and television personality and artistic director. He now lives in France, and in 2007 became a French citizen.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chaya Czernowin</span>

Chaya Czernowin is an Israeli American composer, and Walter Bigelow Rosen Professor of Music at Harvard University.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aribert Reimann</span> German composer, pianist and accompanist

Aribert Reimann is a German composer, pianist and accompanist, known especially for his literary operas. His version of Shakespeare's King Lear, the opera Lear, was written at the suggestion of Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, who sang the title role. His opera Medea after Grillparzer's play premiered in 2010 at the Vienna State Opera. He was a professor of contemporary Lied in Hamburg and Berlin. In 2011, he was awarded the Ernst von Siemens Music Prize for his life's work.

<i>Prometeo</i> Opera by Luigi Nono

Prometeo (Prometheus) is an "opera" by Luigi Nono, written between 1981 and 1984 and revised in 1985. Here the word "opera" carries the generic Italian meaning of "works", as in work of art, and not its usual meaning. Indeed, Nono scornfully labels Prometeo a "tragedia dell'ascolto", a tragedy of listening. Objectively it can be considered a sequence of nine cantatas, the longest lasting 23 minutes. The Italian libretto, by Massimo Cacciari, selects from texts by such varied authors as Aeschylus, Walter Benjamin and Rainer Maria Rilke and presents the different versions of the myth of Prometheus without telling any version literally.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ignatz Waghalter</span> Polish-German composer and conductor

Ignatz Waghalter was a Polish-German composer and conductor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Udo Zimmermann</span> German composer, musicologist, opera director and conductor (1943–2021)

Udo Zimmermann was a German composer, musicologist, opera director, and conductor. He worked as a professor of composition, founded a centre for contemporary music in Dresden, and was director of the Leipzig Opera and the Deutsche Oper Berlin. He directed a contemporary music series for the Bayerischer Rundfunk and a European centre of the arts in Hellerau. His operas, especially Weiße Rose, on a topic he set to music twice, have been performed internationally, and recorded.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marlis Petersen</span> German operatic coloratura soprano (born 1968)

Marlis Petersen is a German operatic coloratura soprano.

<i>La Passion de Simone</i>

La Passion de Simone is an oratorio composed by Kaija Saariaho to a libretto in French by Amin Maalouf, first premiered in a staging by Peter Sellars. The work, subtitled "a musical journey in 15 stations", centers on the life and writings of Simone Weil and was conceived in the Passion Play tradition with episodes in her life linked to the Stations of the Cross. It is composed for SATB chorus, soprano soloist, spoken voice, orchestra and electronic instruments.

Harold Byrns was a German-American conductor and orchestrator.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Theater des Westens</span> Theatre in Berlin, Germany

The Theater des Westens is one of the most famous theatres for musicals and operettas in Berlin, Germany, located at Kantstraße 10–12 in Charlottenburg. It was founded in 1895 for plays. The present house was opened in 1896 and dedicated to opera and operetta. Enrico Caruso made his debut in Berlin here, and the Ballets Russes appeared with Anna Pavlova. In the 1930s it was run as the Volkstheater Berlin. After World War II it served as the temporary opera house of Berlin, the Städtische Oper. In 1961 it became the first theatre in Germany to show musicals. Since then it has become the "German equivalent of Broadway extravaganzas", putting on plays and musical comedies.

Sebastian Weigle is a German conductor and horn player. He is currently Generalmusikdirektor of the Oper Frankfurt and principal conductor of the Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra.

Enrique Mazzola is a Spanish-born Italian conductor. He studied at the Giuseppe Verdi Milan Conservatory.

Lin Wang, is a Chinese composer. Lin Wang was born in Dalian, China, in 1976.

Dietrich Henschel is a German baritone.

Claus H. Henneberg was a German librettist and translator. He worked as dramaturge for the Cologne Opera and the Deutsche Oper Berlin. In the 1976/77 season, he was the Intendant of the Opernhaus Kiel.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Johannes Kalitzke</span> German composer and conductor (born 1959)

Johannes Kalitzke is a German composer and conductor. After studying in Cologne and at the IRCAM in Paris, he was chief conductor at the Musiktheater im Revier in Gelsenkirchen for several years, then led the ensemble musikFabrik and composed operas on commissions in Germany and Austria. He has been Professor of Conducting at the Salzburg Mozarteum from 2015.

<i>Judith</i> (Matthus)

Judith is an opera in two acts by Siegfried Matthus with a libretto by the composer based on Friedrich Hebbel's Judith and texts from the Old Testament. The premiere was on 28 September 1985 at the Komische Oper Berlin, directed by Harry Kupfer. It was recorded in a studio production.

Titus Engel is a Swiss conductor with a focus on both contemporary opera and Baroque opera in historically informed performance.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Claus Guth</span> German theatre director

Claus Guth is a German theatre director, focused on opera. He has directed operas at major houses and festivals, including world premieres such as works of the Munich Biennale, and Berio's Cronaca del luogo at the Salzburg Festival in 1999. Guth is particularly known for his opera productions of the works of Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss. He has received two Faust awards, for Daphne by Richard Strauss in 2010, and for Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande, both at the Oper Frankfurt.

References

  1. Czernowin's Heart Chamber stirs passions at Deutsche Oper Berlin
  2. 1 2 Lyon, Elyse (December 2, 2019). "Deutsche Oper Berlin 2019-20 Review: Heart Chamber". Opera Wire. Retrieved March 21, 2021.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 "Heart Chamber". Deutsche Oper Berlin. Retrieved March 21, 2021.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Clements, Andrew (March 18, 2021). "Czernowin: Heart Chamber review – distinctive composer's opera on love is aurally sumptuous". The Guardian. Retrieved March 21, 2021.