 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(August 2015) |
| The Eighth Wonder | |
|---|---|
| Opera by Alan John | |
 Building of the Sydney Opera House, the topic of the opera | |
| Librettist | Dennis Watkins |
| Language | English |
| Based on | Building of the Sydney Opera House |
| Premiere | 14 October 1995 Opera Theatre, Sydney Opera House |
The Eighth Wonder is a 1995 opera by Alan John and with a libretto by Dennis Watkins about the building process of the Sydney Opera House.
The Eighth Wonder was premiered by The Australian Opera at the Sydney Opera House on 14 October 1995 in the presence of the composer and librettist. The opera was broadcast on television by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation on the Friday evening following the world premiere performance.
It was revived by the same company (by this time known as Opera Australia) again at the Sydney Opera House in 2000.
Lyndon Terracini, artistic director of Opera Australia, announced that the work would be performed as part of the 2016 season at the Sydney Opera House, retitled as Sydney Opera House: The Opera. [1] This new adaptation was performed outdoors on the steps of the Opera House, with the audience wearing headphones to hear the singers and orchestra with clarity. [2]
In 2020, spurred by composer Stephen Rae's desire to listen to the opera and finding it unavailable, a project commenced to promote the opera through a comprehensive website dedicated to the opera. [3] the website was launched in March 2021 and resulted in a cover story feature in the April 2021 edition of Limelight magazine.[ citation needed ]
The opera tells the story of the very building in which it was performed. Soon after the building was commissioned and work had commenced the State Premier who administered its genesis died.
The opera suggests that the Premier believed that if the work was not sufficiently advanced and there was a change of government then the project would be cancelled. Therefore, the foundation work was commenced before the architect had solved the problem of how to build the main structure of the building. The time and cost estimates were also understated to ensure work commenced. There were many other engineering and design problems that had not been solved when work had commenced.
The opera supports the idea that the architect was fully competent to solve these problems and indeed was able to provide solutions that were far more elegant than anything that anyone less inspired, less talented and at one with a vision could provide.
Some time after that there was indeed a change of government. There was much hostility toward the building and the new government was not willing to let the architect complete the project. Much scandal was made of the time and cost of the project. The state bureaucracy wrested control from its architect and the architect's intentions for the interiors of the building were never realised. The architect left the country and disowned the building.
Characters in the opera include the politicians, the architect, an engineer, socialites, and a prominent conductor (the maestro) who betrays the cause of opera for the cause of concert music (see full cast list below). There are also two young artists who firmly identify their future with the building. The names of the characters do not match their real-life counterparts and there are, no doubt, certain other fictional elements.
There is a large chorus and the music is quite accessible, with several bright choral climaxes. The opera consists of two acts, with a total of 15 scenes including Parliament House, the construction site and the suburban backyard where the young artists spend time with their families.
The opera concludes leaving the audience with a sense of loss for the complete vision that was never realised but also with an enormous sense of gratitude and wonderment that as much of that vision that has been completed has been.
Cast:
Creative team:
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Peter Brian Hall was an Australian architect active in Sydney and elsewhere from the 1950s to the early 1990s. Schooled in the tenets of modernism his practice was also informed by a strong sense of the importance of function and context in design. During his early years Hall was the recipient of numerous education scholarships and bursaries, most notably a traineeship and then employment with the office of the New South Wales Government Architect, a source of highly creative architecture during the 1960s. However, Hall is best known for completing the Sydney Opera House after the resignation of its original architect, Jørn Utzon, in February 1966. Aged just 34 he was invited by the Government Architect to act as design architect in the newly formed consortium Hall Todd & Littlemore to resolve the issues which had led to Utzon’s resignation, principally the design of all the interiors and the enclosing glass walls of the unfinished building. The Opera House opened in October 1973 and despite its subsequent success as Sydney’s most popular performance venue, understanding of the work of Hall and his team has been coloured by the controversial circumstances of their appointment. For Hall, both personally and professionally, Utzon’s legacy was a poisoned chalice – an unprecedented challenge to complete the building to a standard commensurate with its sublime exterior, but one that brought little recognition during his lifetime.
