Mark-Anthony Turnage: Festen opera premiere in London
The Royal Opera in London presents the premiere of Mark-Anthony Turnage’s new opera Festen on 14 February, based on the classic film by Thomas Vinterberg. The New Year also sees Simon Rattle conducting first performances of Turnage’s concerto Sco, written for jazz guitarist John Scofield, in London, Paris and Luxembourg and Remembering in Munich and Vienna.
The world premiere of Mark-Anthony Turnage’s new opera Festen opens on 14 February with six performances at the Royal Opera House in London. The production by the Royal Ballet and Opera is staged by Richard Jones, who directed Turnage’s opera Anna Nicole for the same company in 2011. Edward Gardner conducts Royal Opera forces and soloists including Allan Clayton, Stéphane Degout, Gerald Finley, Natalya Romaniw and Eva-Maria Westbroek.
Turnage and librettist Lee Hall come together to adapt Oscar-winning Danish filmmaker Thomas Vinterberg’s 1998 Dogme film Festen into a piercing new opera of trauma and complicity. The new stagework sees decorum descend into chaos when a wealthy hotel owner gathers friends and loved ones to celebrate his 60th birthday. His children must confront the pain of their past – and the man responsible.
Mark-Anthony Turnage comments on his creation of Festen:
“It means an enormous amount to me to write a new opera for The Royal Opera. I had such a great experience working on Anna Nicole that I jumped at the chance of writing another; The Royal Opera has been so loyal to me, really backing Lee Hall and I from the start. The original film by Thomas Vinterberg draws you in from the first minute of action and the heart-breaking story about denial is, unfortunately, more relevant today than ever. Audiences can expect 90 minutes of high drama, lyricism and some dark humour along the way.”
Librettist Lee Hall describes the opera’s setting:
“Christian, the eldest son of Helge, returns home to the family's hotel to celebrate his father’s 60th birthday. The celebration is full of friends, work colleagues and extended family, including Christian’s sister, Helena, and his estranged brother, Michael. The festivities commence, beginning with the ritual greetings and moving on to the celebratory meal, complete with obligatory sentimental songs, speeches and reminiscence. So far, so familiar. But when Christian rises to honour his father, far from the usual praise, his speech reveals home truths of such shocking brutality that surely nothing will be the same again.”
Stageworks and the human dramas revealed within them have formed a vital thread throughout Turnage’s output. His first opera, Greek, established his reputation in 1988 as an artist who dared to forge his own path between modernism and tradition by means of a unique blend of jazz and classical styles. The Silver Tassie was premiered by English National Opera in 2000, winning both the South Bank Show and the Olivier Awards for Opera. Anna Nicole played to sold–out houses at Covent Garden in 2011 and has also been staged in Dortmund, New York, Nuremberg and Wiesbaden, while his opera for family audiences Coraline, was staged by The Royal Opera at the Barbican Theatre in 2018, travelling on to Freiburg, Lille, Saarbrücken, Zürich, Stockholm and Oakland. Turnage has written ballet scores for both Sadler's Wells (Undance) and The Royal Ballet (Trespass and Strapless).
> Festen in London
Mark-Anthony Turnage’s new guitar concerto Sco was commissioned to celebrate Simon Rattle’s 70th birthday, and is written for jazz guitarist John Scofield, who has collaborated with the composer on many major scores across two decades including Blood on the Floor and Scorched. The world premiere by the London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican on 12 January is conducted by Simon Rattle as part of an all-British programme, which will be recorded for broadcast on BBC Radio 3.
Following the London performance, the orchestra and Rattle present the French premiere of Sco at the Philharmonie de Paris on 14 January with a further performance at the Luxembourg Philharmonie on 16 January, all with John Scofield as soloist. Rattle is also on the rostrum the following month for three performances of Turnage’s Remembering, written as a memorial to John Scofield’s son Evan who died young in his twenties. This major 30-minute symphonic statement by Turnage is played by the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, at the Herkulessaal der Residenz in Munich on 13 and 14 February and in its Austrian premiere at the Konzerthaus in Vienna on 15 February.
> Sco in London, Paris and Luxembourg
> Remembering in Munich and Vienna
> Further information on Work: Festen
Image: Royal Opera and Ballet