Output details

Crossing the Sea: Chamber opera for female soloist and string quartet. Commissioned by Wilton's Music Hall, London, UK. Premiered: Wilton's Music Hall, Smith Quartet/Alison Wells, 7th July 2008. Score and CD recording of selected arias (NMC). Review from The Times newspaper evidences date of dissemination. URL links to short documentary film.

Pierre Boulez’s famous 1967 ‘Der Spiegel’ interview urged the burning down of Europe’s opera houses. As a response, this piece asked a fundamental research question: how to evolve innovative approaches to opera that challenge common assumptions about the genre? Answers to this question were provided by utilizing, in the medium of a short opera, several unconventional compositional and theatrical directions. The libretto is a series of arias from literal Tang poetry. Angular Chinese word accents from the original are interpreted as choreographic movements, contrasting responses to very different speech-rhythms implicit in the English translation. This establishes opposing word-stress sources for articulating the dramatic intentions. Overall there is a synthesis of mimetic engagement between musical and choreographic structure. The collective expression of text, music, and movement, establishes separate identities for the protagonists. The music, libretto and video scenography were devised in response to each other, and provide a synthesis of theatre, choreography and music, which emanates equally from both an aesthetic and dramatic point of view. Collaborators: Hazuan Hashim & Phil Maxwell (film); Lou Stein (director).