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Music Text

Libretto by Helmut Krausser (E)

Scoring

Major roles: S,M,T,Bar; Small roles: 2T,2Bar, cabaret singers, actor
2(I&II=picc,II=afl).2(II=corA).3(I=asax,II=tsax,III=bcl).dbcl.2(II=dbn)-2.2.2(II=btrbn).0-perc(2):timp/glsp/vib/xyl/African Marimba/t.bells/gongs/cel/2SD/BD(lg)/Drum kit/5cyms(2 lg)/2wdbl(lg)/log dr/tom-t/bongos/whip/maracas/tgl/bells/2 hi metals/cast/guiro/tamb/chains/2cowbells/lion's roar/(hi resonant) iron/hi.bell(unpitched)/Rattle or rasp-pft-harp-synth-elec gtr.bass gtr-strings(min.5.5.4.3.2)

Abbreviations (PDF)

Opera
For full details on this stagework, including synopsis and roles, please visit our Opera section.
Publisher

Boosey & Hawkes

Territory
This work is available from Boosey & Hawkes for the world.

Availability

World Premiere
06/05/2016
Walt Disney Concert Hall, Los Angeles, CA
Pierre Audi, director / Los Angeles Philharmonic / Reinbert de Leeuw
Programme Note
Press Quotes

"The opera takes the aged Athanasius Kircher on a time-travelling journey back through the important events of his life, on which he is guided by a boy who may be an angel or an apprentice devil, even perhaps a reincarnation of the scholar himself as a young man... There are elements of allusiveness and surreal fantasy to Kircher's adventures and encounters, which seem to take place in a Bosch-like world of grotesques..."
Opera

"...a dizzying work that's vast in its scope yet unerringly claustrophobic. Musically, it is brilliant and deep... Andriessen is the great argumentative opera composer of our day... a clear-eyed Dutch sceptic and humanist who surfs the alarmingly narrow arteries that separate life from death, wisdom from belief, the known from the unknown... Andriessen's music compels from start to finish."
Los Angeles Times

"Using a mixture of languages, children's songs, Baroque music, jazz and modernism, it's a dizzying kaleidoscopic creation from a master of stagecraft."
BBC Music Magazine

Subjects
Recommended Recording
cd_cover

Leigh Melrose / Lindsay Kesselman / Cristina Zavalloni /
Los Angeles Philharmonic / Reinbert de Leeuw
Nonesuch 561784

Links

Listening
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