Kafka in Copenhagen
Andante's website alerted me to the inauguration of Copenhagen's new $441 million opera house.
I checked out the house's gorgeous website. They've commissioned a new work for the inaugural season - Kafka's Trial by Poul Ruders. For those of us who have heard Ruders' previous opera, The Handmaid's Tale, and/or love Kafka's novel and have pondered the 
prospects of its operatic treatment, this is quite exciting.
A year from now, Ruders' work will be overshadowed on this side of the Atlantic by the October premiere of John Adams' Doctor Atomic in San Francisco as the opera event of 2005. What would be wonderful is if the two companies traded these productions for their next seasons. Adams and Ruders are both brilliant opera composers and are both dealing in these works with timely psychological and sociological issues. Just about every big news story since November 2, 2005 has seemed like a Kafkaesque nightmare to me. Adams' work will undoubtedly be released on Nonesuch. Hopefully the recording industry will be smart and give us a quick release of the Ruders work, too.
In other opera news, I haven't seen mention at trrill or Sieglinde's Diaries of the passing of one of my all-time favorite singers, Victoria de Los Angeles. The purity and effortless, seamless range from utmost delicacy to overwhelming power match her near perfect track record on recordings - everything she chose to do she did with utmost integrity and beauty.
Word on Victoria. Let's have a moment of silence in honor of Carmen, De Falla Songs, Chants d'Auvergne, Suor Angelica...
Rebecca
Posted by: Rebecca Ringle | January 17, 2005 at 10:52 PM
Poul Ruders and Kafka? I have to say that I was extremely disappointed by The Handmaid's Tale when I saw it at ENO a couple of years back. The novel offered great material for a really interesting operatic treatment, especially with its stark and stylised character types, and while the production took up this challenge, the music did not. So it's trepidation more than excitement for me...
Martin
Posted by: Martin Suckling | January 18, 2005 at 07:45 AM
Rebecca - Hey girl! Hope you're doing well and miss you. Mikey says howdy!
Martin - I'll have to listen through Handmaid's Tale again - I bought the recording right when it was released and listened to it obsessively for a while. Maybe it works better on recording? I've found that's true of a few operas, including Peter Grimes, which I've seen four times live now and still haven't been as impressed as I feel I should be...On recording I love it, though.
Posted by: Marcus | January 18, 2005 at 09:06 AM