Parallel symmetries and random synchronicities at Festival d’Aix

By Pwyll ap Sion, 14 July 2019

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Reviewed at Conservatoire Darius Milhaud: Auditorium Campra, Aix-en-Provence on 13 July 2019

van der Aa, Blank out (création française)

Klaas Stok, Conductor

Michel van der Aa, Director

Miah Persson, Soprano

Roderick Williams, Baritone

Nederlands Kamerkoor

Michel van der Aa’s Theory of Flames: defining opera for a modern age

Clare Varney, 6th March

British singers Mary Bevan and Roderick Williams lead the cast in Dutch National Opera’s latest ground-breaking opera, merging live music with pre-recorded film and electronics.

****1

Blank Out: a heightened sensory trip

Jenny Camilleri, 20th March

Soprano Miah Persson is the riveting protagonist in Michel van der Aa’s genre-crossing new opera, a fascinating revisiting of a tragic event.

***11

Première of Michel van der Aa's Sunken Garden at the Barbican

Paul Kilbey, 12th April

What’s the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the phrase “3D occult mystery film opera”? Because I’ll bet that whatever this makes you imagine is nothing like the reality of composer/director Michel van der Aa and librettist David Mitchell’s Sunken Garden, which debuted at the Barbican last night.

****1

Intime Zukunftsmusik: Michel van der Aas Upload in Amsterdam

Michael Klier, 1st October

Michel van der Aa zwingt das Publikum, sich mit der zukünftigen Möglichkeit, ewiges Lebens mittels AGI zu gewinnen, auseinanderzusetzen.

*****

A sorta fairy tale: Sleepers Awake premieres at Opera Philadelphia

Cameron Kelsall, 22nd April

A new opera by Gregory Spears subverts the Sleeping Beauty trope, with middling results.

**111

Asmik Grigorian strengthens the Met’s revival of Eugene Onegin

Susan Stempleski, 20th April

The Lithuanian soprano’s riveting performance as the central character in Tchaikovsky’s operatic masterpiece lights up Deborah Warner’s mostly bland production.

****1

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Pwyll ap Sion

A composer and musicologist, Pwyll studied music at Oxford and is currently Professor of Music at Bangor University in Wales. He has published several books and articles on the music of Michael Nyman, Steve Reich and Philip Glass and is considered an authority on minimalist and postminimalist music. He writes regularly for Gramophone and Strad magazines, has given talks on Glass and Louis Andriessen for the Barbican’s ‘Total Immersion’ concert series, has been interviewed on BBC Radios 3 and 4, and contributed composer profiles and articles for the BBC Proms.

Parallel symmetries and random synchronicities: Michel van der Aa’s Blank Out at Festival d’Aix