Euridice

1 dancing singer (female), 3 dancers/narrators (female), dancer (male); bfl.dbcl-perc-pft(=kbd)-vln.vc.db-electronics

“The voice, and voices, are at the heart of the piece. They whisper and moan, try to get a word in, remember, reconstruct. Iris ter Schiphorst’s chamber opera Eurydike, Szenen aus der Unterwelt (Eurydice, Scenes from the Underworld) struggles with the myth of silence… Suspecting a buried layer of cultural history, the Berlin-based composer focusses on the self-reflection of this woman who, from Monteverdi to Gluck, has always been silent… In this work, gestural dance performance, singing, verbal comment and instrumental parts merge in an eloquent, touching manner…” (Frank Kämpfer, Deutschlandfunk/Musikjournal, 23 September 2002)

“… In comparison, Iris ter Schiphorst’s Eurydike, Szenen aus der Unterwelt (Eurydice, Scenes from the Underworld), which opened the evening at the Theater am alten Markt (…), is much more memorable, and – not only regarding its well-grounded view on Eurydice, a figure neglected in the myth – more modern than the two ensuing parts of the Orpheus cycle. A few serpentine instrumental lines from the cello and violin at the outset are sufficient for ter Schiphorst to create a much more suggestive atmosphere than her colleagues achieve with all their acoustic and visual kerfuffle …” (Wolfgang Sandner, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 24 September 2002)

Poetic