Exciting insights

Active audience at the opera studio

During "Hold Your Breath", the audience was invited to join in.(Bild: ©anja koehler | andereart.de)

Exciting facts about the Bregenz Festival's opera premiere "Hold Your Breath" were revealed at Insight No. 3 on Tuesday.

That evening, the audience sat around a large open area in the lake studio of the Bregenz Festival Theater. The question as to why this was the case was soon answered. To the sounds of music by Irish composer Éna Brennan, the choreographer of the project, Caroline Finn, asked the audience to perform a kind of evening gymnastics. For example: "Now everyone who wears a buttoned top, step out" or "Now all vegans". The audience can expect something similar at the performances on August 15 and 17.

It sounds light-hearted and funny, but the themes of this opera premiere entitled "Hold Your Breath" are very serious. In nine scenes, the coronavirus pandemic and the rigorous way politicians are dealing with it are discussed first, followed by climate change as the play progresses. It is unusual for an opera to address such topical issues.

Concern for our nature
This is thanks to Sir David Pountney, former artistic director of the Bregenz Festival, who wrote the libretto. Portuguese visual artist Hugo Canoilas, who makes the sea the subject of his works in the broadest sense, is also concerned about our natural world. For Bregenz, he has created an octopus, on the one hand in a painting several meters long, which we have already seen in an earlier "Insight", and on the other with an octopus sculpture, one arm of which, still uncoloured, was carried in by ten people. The workshop stage on which "Hold Your Breath" is performed is big enough. As the name suggests ("Okto" - "eight"), an octopus has eight arms or legs, but the Bregenz one only has seven. Why was not revealed, but there are eight instrumentalists who bring Éna Brennan's music to life.

Impressive stage presence
They are members of the Vorarlberg Symphony Orchestra and are conducted by Karen Ni Bhroin. According to the composer present, this music is stylistically very diverse: baroque-inspired fanfares and dances alternate with free-tonal sections and improvisation. There are also electronic sounds, some of which are played separately, others together with the Life musicians.

Of course, because we are in the opera, there are also singers. Among others, we experience the well-known Shira Patchornik or Scott Hendricks, who has already impressed with his stage presence on the lake as well as in the house.