Adriana and Simone
24th January 2006
© E. Mahoudeau
Adriana Mater, the second opera by Kaija Saariaho, receives its world premiere production at L’Opéra Bastille, Paris on March 30, 2006, with performances continuing through April. Set in the present, the opera alternates scenes and dream sequences – mingled voices, masked beings – all around the context of one family in a time of war. Adriana Mater's principal role is sung by Patricia Bardon, mezzo-soprano, and the bass-baritone is Stephen Milling (Jouni Kokora, April 10). Peter Sellars (pictured left) directs, and Esa-Pekka Salonen (pictured right) conducts.
The libretto for Adriana Mater is by Saariaho's long-term collaborator, Amin Maalouf, who also provides the text for another world premiere for Saariaho, La Passion de Simone, which will be given at Peter Sellars’ New Crowned Hope festival on November 26, 2006. Described as a ‘musical path in fifteen stations’, this new oratorio for soprano, chorus and orchestra explores the story of French philosopher Simone Weil through a work of remembrance: fifteen ‘stations of the cross’ in her difficult life.
