We have just launched the pre-sale of tickets for New Opera Days Ostrava. They are available individually and we recommend a discounted festival ticket for all performances. The program of the seventh biennial will present seven original productions: five in world premiere, two in Czech premiere. Music by Pascal Dusapin (France) and Amir Shpilman (Israel/Germany) will be performed for the first time in Ostrava, and opera by Ann Cleare (Ireland) will be seen in the Czech Republic for the first time. The performance Russolo’s Bitter End features intonarumori, the noise instruments of futurist Luigi Russolo. NODO approaches the Year of Czech Music in reverse: the festival gives opportunities to composers for whom it is crucial to create in/for the Czech Republic, regardless of their nationality. This year, the Czech composers will be represented by František Chaloupka and Haštal Hapka, New Yorker Ian Davis is working on another opera commissioned by the NODO Festival, and a production team from Vienna and Berlin is coming to Ostrava.
"Identifying the work of an artist in terms of nationality is not a matter of course. There is the question of what can be included under the term 'Czech music', and what seemingly 'Czech' also belongs to the culture of another nation," says Petr Kotík, the artistic director of the Ostrava Centre for New Music, in his reflection on the Year of Czech Music, in reference to Mozart's opera Don Giovanni. The question of support is therefore more fundamental for our festival than the composer's birth certificate, because without practical, material, and intellectual support, many works would not have had a chance to be created.
František Chaloupka (1981) is writing his fourth opera for NODO – his first opera Eva & Lilith premiered at the first Opera Biennale in 2012. He is currently working on the opera The Sell-Out, in which he is freely inspired by the personality of the eminent Czech educator and thinker Jan Amos Komensky. To quote the author: “The beginning of the whole idea was the relationship between Komensky and his friend and patron, Count De Geer. Louis De Geer was a Dutch-Swedish banker who owned a thriving arms industry and supplied arms to Sweden, the Netherlands, and Bohemia. Ironically, Komensky’s spiritual writings and textbooks were – to put it simply – sponsored by the Swedish arms industry. And although The Sell-Out is not an opera about Komensky, this was the initial inspiration for the whole work." Chaloupka's Sell-Out is an opera about an organization, and, more specifically, a self-driving and navigational system called AMOS (Aircraft Maintenance Operational System). It will feature soloists, chorus, orchestra, and will also include live cinema. Baritone Felix Heuser, soprano Markéta Schaffartzik and countertenor Valentino Blasina will perform solo roles. Canticum Ostrava, directed by choirmaster Yurii Galatenko, will perform alongside the international Ostravská banda, augmented by players from ONO – Ostrava New Orchestra, conducted by Bruno Ferrandis. The director and stage designer of the production is Rocc. "Working with him is fantastic. He respects that a new work is being created and tries to help it in the most natural way possible," praises Chaloupka. The Sell-Out will have its world premiere on June 27, at 6:30 pm, at the Antonín Dvořák Theatre.
The American composer Ian Davis (1989) has a long-standing bond with Ostrava. Since 2019, he has participated three times in the Ostrava Days Institute as a resident – his composition Pale Blue World ended last year's Biennial with great success, and it was this repeated positive experience that led to him being approached to work on the opera. Davis also teaches music theory and composition at the Brooklyn Conservatory of Music and also teaches in the New York Philharmonic's Very Young Composers program.
His works are inspired by folk music, canonic progressions, counterpoint, chance, children's works, and low-fidelity music. For the NODO Festival, he is preparing Ephemeral Pulse, a short operatic work for chamber orchestra, vocalists, and electronics. The text is taken from Emily Dickinson's poem Forever – is composed of Nows –. The musical material was generated through loosely-structured improvisation which was transcribed, orchestrated, and laid as a bed for the text to be set upon. Both content and process reflect on the concept of time; its passing, its divisions, and the fleeting / lasting nature of spontaneous decisions. This ambient opera is intended for orchestra (Ostravská banda), choir (Canticum Ostrava), and electronics. The work will be conducted by Petr Kotík, the scenic realization will be led by Jiří Nekvasil and David Bazika (June 29, Jiří Myron Theatre, Ostrava).
The Prague composer Haštal Hapka (1997) is currently finishing his first opera Once Everybody’s Here, which he will debut at NODO. "My relationship with opera is quite strange. My mother worked at the State Opera in Prague when I was a kid, so I spent many evenings in her office and always ran down to the box at a certain hour so as not to miss my favourite part of La Traviata, Il barbiere di Siviglia or Madame Butterfly. Then the situation changed and I haven't been to any opera in recent years, so unlike other classical music, I have almost no exposure to contemporary work when it comes to opera. Still, I immediately nodded at the opportunity without much thought. Maybe to find out what opera is at all," Hapka stated. He comes with a more intimate and less traditional cast for opera: the singers (and actors) will be accompanied by a string quartet and an ensemble of jazz instrumentalists from the jazz department of HAMU. The opera takes place during a family’s Sunday lunch, the lazy atmosphere of which is constantly disturbed by the gloomy news of a police investigation of a crime. Although the identity of the perpetrator is unknown, the details of the investigation seep into the minds of all the family members, raising questions about what it means to be a hero these days and where the origins of so-called heroic acts lie. The opera will be directed by Vilma Bořkovec, also a graduate of HAMU, a tireless supporter of opera, and the creator of a number of site-specific projects.
Details of the other four operas by teams from Austria, Germany, and Israel, along with our Czech team, will be in the next press release. Approximately 120 people will be involved in the production of this year’s NODO Festival, making NODO the largest continuous showcase of contemporary opera in the Czech Republic.
Advance ticket sales available via GoOut or at the Ostrava Information Service website or branches. All information on ticket sales is available on the website www.newmusicostrava.cz/en.
NODO / New Opera Days Ostrava is presented with support from the Statutory City of Ostrava, the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic, the Moravian-Silesian Region, and with thanks to other institutions, foundations, and private sector support. We would like to thank Libor and Veronika Winkler and Martin and Hana Vohánek for their continuous generous support to the Ostrava Centre for New Music. NODO 2024 is presented in cooperation with Neue Oper Wien, the Ostrava Puppet Theatre, and the OSTRA GROUP.
The general media partner of the festival is Czech Radio Vltava, which will record two opera performances, and the main media partner is Czech Television. NODO / New Opera Days Ostrava is organised by the Ostrava New Music Centre and the National Moravian-Silesian Theatre.
9/04/2024 Info:
www.newmusicostrava.cz bellaunavitaalloperablogspot.com
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