Faust Goes Techno
A still from a new high-tech production of Berlioz's "Damnation de Faust," premiering this weekend at the Met. An "interactive opera," the production synthesizes performers and sets through technology: flocks of digital birds fly in sync with an aria, video grass parts its blades for oncoming soldiers, high-def water reflects a passing boat, a JumboTron mirrors a singer's love song in flames.
To bolster his argument that the technology is appropriate, [director Robert] Lepage cites Berlioz’s epoch, a time of technological innovations like photography and electricity. “All these ideas were around,” he said. “They believed these things were modern alchemy.”"Techno-Alchemy at the Opera," audio slideshow. (Photo credit: Sara Krulwich.)
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Also, xkcd.
So - they are depicting hell's torments by playing techno? Seems appropriate. Remember, if the robots win, we'll have to listen to techno.
"high-def water"
Sweet, all we get around here is the regular kind. Does HD water work with all your current cups and glasses, or did you have to update the firmware?
What's cool about the Met is that you can see simulcasts of the opera at movie theaters around the country if you're interested:
http://www.metoperafamily.org/metopera/broadcast/hd_events_next.aspx
Here another interesting techno - classic collaboration of carl craig and moritz von oswald recomposing ravel and mussorgsky
http://www.boomkat.com/item.cfm?id=143943
@2 Eustace
Interestingly, the Vatican would consider hell to be a mix of Heavy Metal, Punk, and Jazz.
source
Mortgage backed securities are the new alchemy.
@#2: Nope, all the original Berlioz music. Only the stage production has more tech elements than usual...
@1 you beat me to it!!!
Well, what do you know. The Met is finally recognizing the existence of the downtown crowd. Took 'em long enough, particularly given how long Phillip Glass and Steve Reich operas have been selling out BAM (uh...decades!).
I saw the Glass's Voyage there some years back and the response was incomprehension. I heard one guy said, "Well, I liked it but it wasn't really opera".
No doubt this has something to do with James Levine's waning influence (and his slow steady stream of arrests).
Anyone up for seeing Alban Berg's Lulu?
Trikitixa @ 4 - You can see it in other countries too.
It looks like the HD broadcast will be November 22nd.
Sorry for the double-post, but - a few years ago I saw another opera directed by Lepage; Schoenberg's Bluebeard's Castle.
It was the most beautiful bad design I've seen - as a sculpture or an installation piece, it was amazing. It would have been great if you could have ordered a beer and a spinach salad, watched only as much as you wanted, and had a quiet conversation without offending everyone around you.
But as a sitting-in-worshipful-rows opera it was a big static eye-squint-headache inducing piece of suckage.
That said, I will still probably try to go to the movie theatre to catch this one.
@9, the timing of the post was uncanny, eh?
László Moholy-Nagy would be proud!
i think years ago (more than five, for sure) the catalonian theater group "la fura dels baus" made a very simillar "fausto 3.0". you should check it out.
they have a crappy website, but i'm sure with a little time you guys can research a little about this. i think even that they're still staging it...
Hey Dragonfrog...
Schonberg didn't write Bluebeard's Castle...I think it's Bartok (but you made a very educated error).
Schonberg I think only wrote one out-and-out Opera, Moses and Aron, which I saw at the NYC Opera Company (sold out, believe it or not), and which was absolutely balls-to-the-walls ass-kicking.
Thank you Keeper of the Lantern, it was indeed Bartok.
It was actually two operas in one night - Bartok's Bluebeard's Castle first, then after the intermission, Schoenberg's Erwartung. The Canadian Opera Company did those last year.
Actually it turns out I was somewhat unfair. I had thought Erwartung had a different director, but it was Lepagewho did stage direction for both, and Erwartung kicked ass. So to give him credit: I've seen two Lepage operas; one sucked and one was awesome.
another article about the production
http://blogularsynthesis.blogspot.com/2008/11/metropolitan-opera-lepage-frterer-bring.html
How is it an "Interactive" Opera? Can the public *interact* or is it all about using cool buzzwords to attract some publicity?