Details
Royal Festival Hall
Southbank Centre
Belvedere Rd
South Bank
London
SE1 8XX
England
Programme
Karlheinz Stockhausen – Donnerstag aus Licht (1980)
Performers
Maxime Pascal – Conductor
London Sinfonietta
Le Balcon
Royal Academy of Music Manson Ensemble
New London Chamber Choir
Other concerts in this Series (+)
Programme Note
For the first time since 1985, Stockhausen’s monumental opera Donnerstag aus Licht (Thursday from Light) returns to the UK. Maxime Pascal conducts the combined forces of Le Balcon, the London Sinfonietta, the New London Chamber Choir and students from the Royal Academy of Music, in a new production directed by Benjamin Lazar. A great avant-garde innovator, Stockhausen only turned to opera aged 50. He spent 26 years developing his seven-part epic, the Licht cycle, which explored the story of mankind as a cosmic saga, and linked each opera to a day of the week, a celestial body and a colour. Donnerstag (Thursday, Jupiter, bright blue) is the fourth opera in the cycle and follows the story of Michael, an angel in human form, as he relives the composer’s childhood, learns music, grows up, falls in love, travels around the world and overcomes forces of evil.
