FULL UNMÖGLICHE OPER or IMPOSSIBLE OPERA (Zorka Wollny) Oldenburg 2017
Information on the Performance
- Work Title: Unmögliche Oper or Impossible Opera
- Composer: Zorka Wollny
- Libretto: Libretto Text, Libretto Index
- Venue & Opera Company: Edith-Russ-Haus für Medienkunst, Oldenburg, Germany
- Recorded: 2017
- Type: Staged Opera Live
- Singers: Alessandra Eramo
- Conductor:
- Orchestra:
- Chorus: Bokaleta Chor, ChoRioso, Chor Bundschuh, Rhythms of Resistance
- Stage Director:
- Costume Designer:
Information about the Recording
- Published by: Edith-Russ-Haus for Media Art
- Date Published: 2023
- Format: Streaming
- Quality Video: 4 Audio:4
- Subtitles: nosubs
- Video Recording from: YouTube FULL VIDEO
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON THIS PERFORMANCE
The “Impossible Opera” is a project by Polish artist and composer Zorka Wollny, who is currently a scholarship holder of the Lower Saxony Foundation at the Edith Russ House for Media Art. The 40-minute musical composition with choreographic elements was developed especially for the performance venue and aims to bring together citizens as well as stakeholders such as NGOs, choirs or minority representatives. Zorka’s goal is to create a composition between manifestation and vocal concert – a powerful collaborative work. The central component of the “musical demonstration” will be singing or the use of voices. Wollny aims to bring together social and acoustic forces, working with diverse groups of people. The work, which can include murmuring, slurping, or whistling, is as abstract as it is political, as poetic as it is down-to-earth.
The main focus of the piece is voice – its power in context of possibilities of expressing one’s needs and having a say in the public debate. I work with techniques that focus on a broad range of voice expression, from soundless powerlessness to screaming.
Sounds are largely abstract. The noise base of the composition contains sounds made by a large number of performers, like murmurs, whispers, whistling, loud breathing etc – the scale is stretched between breath and screaming. Fragments of text appear against this background. They come in a form of single syllables, interrupted words, incomplete slogans, fragments of postulates, manifestos or prayers. Choreography draws inspiration from demonstrations and protests.
All these activities are part of an hour-long musical piece, its main axis being an opposition of anarchy and system, protest and consent.