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Operas/Theatre/Dance
• Operas
Ophelias
Sera
• Dance productions
• Musictheatre
• Theatre
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Operas
Ophelias: Death by water singing
Cecilie Løveid/ Henrik Hellstenius
Seeing an opera production is like experiencing the theatre of dreams; you step into a space of experience where movement, music, text and stage are woven together. It is this unified weave that is the unique thing about opera – not the fact that a story is told, that there is singing or that someone moves around on a stage. It is the unifying power generated when these elements merge together that gives you the special experience of the opera.
The framework for Henrik Hellstenius’ and Cecilie Løveid’s new opera is the Danish chronicler Saxo’s myth of Amled, which is also told in the better known version Hamlet by Shakespeare. Shakespeare tells us a masculine story about the hero Hamlet, who avenges the murder of his father the King. Hamlet’s mother Gertrude has married her husband’s murderer and Hamlet is to marry Ophelia, the daughter of Polonius, the adviser of her father’s murderer. Saxo depicts his Amled as mad – but is he mad or is it a role he is playing? In Shakespeare’s play, to test whether he really is mad, a ‘date’ is arranged with Ophelia. In Ophelias: Death by Water Singing, Hellstenius and Løveid deal with Ophelia’s awareness of having been used and betrayed.
The opera begins at the moment she drowns in the stream, and we look back at her experiences – falling in love with Prince Hamlet, her anticipation of becoming Queen; their rendezvous, her pregnancy and his betrayal. The forest nymphs (“woodmaidens”) and the Queen fatefully bring Hamlet and Ophelia together. It is all about desire without morality, about betrayal and about exploiting other people for one’s own advantage. The myth of Ophelia is told in modern but poetic and evocative language, as a dream play.
The text is in English.
(Bilder fra Ophelias)
The young Ophelia is brought to a decaying court to marry an unstable Hamlet. Hamlet falls in love, Ophelia falls in love. Both are taken out to the forest for a rendezvous where they are united. Afterwards Ophelia is left pregnant and abandoned by Hamlet, who kills the King. Ophelia goes mad after understanding that her Hamlet is a murderer and a betrayer. She drowns herself in the river.
This is a description of the external plot in the opera Ophelias: Death by water singing, but this plot is only the setting, the narrative framework. Opera as an art form is the theatre of dreams, where action, movement, music, text and scenery are interwoven. Opera is a composite experience where you can step into a space of experience in which sound, scenery and text together say something that none of them can say individually. In the work with Ophelias I have experienced it as important that these elements do not all tell the same “story”. The experience become stronger if each speaks from its own corner and the synthesis of meaning arises in those who watch and listen; if action, scenery, sound and text have a high degree of independence, while at the same time they talk about the same thing.
Opera is an art form where you can try to say something true about something that is not real. The opera or music drama is a platform for exploring the non-realistic, the non-authentic story. In my work with opera I am preoccupied with creating a ‘space’ between the pure musical experience and the experience of scenery, action and text.
Henrik Hellstenius 2005
See Movie
Facts about the opera and the production:
Composer: Henrik Hellstenius
Librettist: Cecilie Løveid
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Premiere: 23rd September 2005 in Sandnes, Norway
with a further five performances at the Ultima
Festival in October 2005 in Oslo, Norway.
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Production in Oslo:
Orchestra: Cikada Ensemble
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Singers:
Ophelia: Elisabeth Holmertz
Hamlet: Paul Keohonen
Gertrude: Guri Egge
Woodmaidens: Eva-Kristine Hernes, Tora Augestad,
Berit Nordbakken Solset
The Dead King: Lars Øyno
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Produced by Opera Vest in collaboration with
Sandnes Kulturhus, Stavanger Symphony
Orchestra, Cikada Ensemble and the Ultima Festival.
The opera is an AdOpera project.
A PR-DVD from the production in Norway can be
ordered from Opera Vest or
Edition Wilhelm Hansen AS
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Axel Hellstenius/ Henrik Hellstenius:
Sera
a chamber opera about silence and noise, chaos and an angel...
The idea for Sera was conceived by Axel og Henrik Hellstenius. It was further developed and enhanced in the forum Kulturkobleriet, a creative forum initiated by among others the Norwegian Cultural Council during the mid-90’s. The goal was the creation of new Norwegian music drama. Kulturkobleriet brought together three composers and three librettists, who were able to test their ideas and get feedback on them in seminars held in London, among other places. Kulturkobleriet developed eventually into Operatoriet, a national forum for the development and tryout of contemporary musical drama. Sera had a trial run under the auspices of Operatoriet for an audience and a group of producers during the spring of 1998.
Pictures from the production at The Polish National Opera in Warszaw
Sera was premiered in Oslo in october 2000, played in Bergen and recorded same year at the label Aurora.
Listen to extract
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Henrik Hellstenius – music
Axel Hellstenius – libretto
Morten Cranner – director
Pierrea André Valade – conductor
Sera – Toril Carlsen
Abel – Jerker Dahlin
Lillit – Anne Lise Berntsen
God – Ketil Hugaas
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Produced by OPERA VEST
Booklet (pdf)
Sera received a second production at The Polish National Opera in Warszaw november 2003.
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Piotr Cholodzinski - director
Micha Klauza – conductor
Rolf Alme – designer
Sera – Toril Carlsen
Abel – Jerker Dahlin
Lillit – Anna Einarsson
God – Ketil Hugaas
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Produced by Tieatre Wielki Opera Narodowa and Opera Vest
http://www.teatrwielki.pl/galeria.php?action=search&full=1&id=206&nlang=en
http://www.culture.pl/en/culture/artykuly/wy_in_premiera_sera_warszawa
Synopsis
The Chorus – Lilith’s (invisible) Sect – praises the beautiful Silence. Lilith enters, and together with The Sect she praises and thanks God.
God, resigned and with a cold, wanders around in his own heaven, listening to prayers in all the languages of the world. An angel, the childish and playful messenger Sera, makes fun of the prayers. But she becomes deadly serious when she hears Lilith’s prayer, asking God to send down his messenger because her great project has been completed. Sera believes that Lilith is mad, and tries to shirk her duty, but God orders her to go. Sera obeys, telling God that he will regret it.
Sera and Lilith meet. Even though Lilith tries to appear humble, their mutual dislike for one another is unmistakable. While Sera wants to be done quickly, Lilith belabors the fact that her lifework is now complete, and that Sera must promise to safely deliver the final CDs to God. Sera replies that she can always be relied upon. But as a pile of CDs is handed to her, one of them falls to the ground. Lilith gets mad at Sera, but her rage turns into a convulsive seizure, in which she is overpowered by a horrible, inner noise. Sera contemplates the suffering woman, wondering why Lilith can’t understand that the problem is located inside her head, and not caused by the sounds of the exterior world?
Sera sings about Lilith’s plan to free the world from noise and introduce The Great Silence. Sera hates the project, and has decided to do something about it, but she can’t do it herself. Therefore she has chosen a man – an Abel – who loves sound above all other things. Sera is convinced that he will understand what is about to happen, and put an end to the madness.
In his studio, Abel is working with the creation and exploration of sounds. He is a workaholic sound freak, and his wife has recently left him. They are fighting noisily on the phone about their settlement, when Sera rings at the door. Abel doesn’t want to open, but Sera manages to get in nevertheless. The sceptical Abel is both dumbfounded and a bit apprehensive at having an angel come to visit. He wants to know who she is and what she wants? Sera answers cryptically that, since Abel loves sound, he will soon both understand and act. With one finger Sera touches Abel’s
forehead, and she is gone.
When Abel soon after discovers a CD, hovering in mid-air, he becomes
frightened. Should he make a phone call? The police, the press, his mom? But curiosity triumphs over fear. He decides to play the CD, and hears a collection of all sorts of sounds.
Abel is still working when Lilith comes barging in, demanding back her CD. Abel denies having anything that belongs to her, but Lilith and her Sect torture and hurt him until he hands it over. Lilith wants to know whether Sera has revealed what is on it? Abel shakes his head. Lilith answers that he should be glad. Otherwise things would be looking grim for him. When Lilith has disappeared, Abel reveals that he has made a copy...
Back in God’s heaven Sera delivers the CDs, and God archives them in his gigantic, heavenly library. Sera feels that she is now entitled to a holiday. For at least 1000 years! Following tough negotiations, they agree on 500. Sera leaves heaven just as Lilith’s voice is heard. She is calling for God.
Abel is in his studio, listening to the copy of the mysterious CD and reflecting upon the phenomenon of sound. What does sound actually mean to human beings? Suddenly Sera appears, and immediately understands that Lilith has been there and hurt Abel. She dresses his wounds and tries to find out how much he has gathered by listening to the CD. They are interrupted by God, summoning Sera. In order for Abel not to see God’s countenance and die, she renders him unconscious.
God reveals himself, accusing Sera of meddling with his work. Sera tries to defend herself by explaining that Lilith’s plan would lead to a catastrophe. But God doesn’t want to listen. Sadly he avows that he shall have to punish Sera and send her into nothingness. Sera desperately tries to convince God that for once she is right, and He is wrong. But God simply commands Sera to fetch the missing CD from Lilith and bring it up to him. At once!
Sera awakens Abel and tells him about the danger they are facing: as soon as God receives the final CD, The Great Silence will commence. This will mean a world without sounds! Abel does not know how he can stop this from happening. Sera begs him to simply love sound and create sounds, just as he usually does. She draws a magic protective ring around Abel before she leaves.
When Sera and Lilith meet, Lilith is furious. Sera attempts to talk Lilith out of what she believes to be an insane plan. But Lilith, with God on her side, is utterly convinced that she is creating paradise. All this noise has held humans imprisoned inside themselves, and has lead them away from their true, genuine selves. Only Silence can set them free again. As Sera is about to leave with the last CD, excited shouting is heard from The Sect (Chorus). They have discovered that Abel is about to create new sounds. Lilith calls out that he must be stopped!
Lilith comes to see Abel, but cannot stop him, since he is protected by the magic circle. Inside of the circle, Abel is producing new, electronic sounds. Lilith attempts to convince Abel that sound is chaos and death, and that silence alone will lead to peace and a better life. But Abel believes that sound is life, and that life is sound. He thinks that Lilith should rather punch out her own ears than to force a silence upon him and others that they do not wish. Lilith manages to restrain Abel from any further sound production, and tells him that all the sounds he just made had already been recorded. She holds the CD triumphantly up into the air, when Abel jumps out of the circle, grasps the CD, and breaks it. Lilith gets another seizure. She orders
The Sect to restrain Abel, places a set of headphones over his ears, and turns up the volume so loud that he finally dies from it! Sera cannot do a thing.
And now God appears! Both Lilith and Sera are naturally appalled and try to find excuses for themselves. But Sera is sent away into nothingness. Lilith knows that she must be condemned to eternal silence, and punches out her own ears. Abel is left lying alone on the ground. Sera comes sneaking in and breathes new life into him. She gives Abel a final angelic kiss and disappears before he has completely come to his senses again. In heaven, God wanders around, listening to prayers, still resigned and with a cold. Sera tries to console and tend to him, not caring that God thinks she has been expelled...
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Livet er lyd, lyd er livet…
Noen ord som innledning til Henrik Hellstenius Opera Sera.
Av Tomasz Cyz
(pdf)
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Dance productions with Ingun Bjørnsgaard Prosjekt:
pli à pli
Premiere February 24 1999 at Kampnagel, Hamburg, Germany
Choreographer: Ingun Bjørnsgaard
Musician: Frode Larsen, violin
Original music: Henrik Hellstenius: Five Imprints of Time III, solo for harpsichord
http://www.ingunbp.no/
the afternoon and the others
Premiere September 22 2000 at the PRIMO Festival, Copenhagen, Denmark
Choreographer: Ingun Bjørnsgaard
Composer: Henrik Hellstenius (Imprints for string trio
Book of Songs
Premiere January 11 2002 at tanzhaus nrw, Düsseldorf, Germany
Choreographer: Ingun Bjørnsgaard
Original music: Henrik Hellstenius
Cello: Emery Cardas
Violin: Frode Larsen
Four Pieces including Sjoa and Skjåk
World premiere at the TanzBremen dance festival 6 March 2004
Choreography: Ingun Bjørnsgaard
Composers: Per Henrik Svalastog, Henrik Hellstenius and Rolf Wallin
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Musictheatre production in 2006
Ning
Transitt
«Is this where you are? If it is not, go to where you are. I will wait for you there.»
(Inscription on the floor in Oslo airport)
This performance looks at the journey as a physical, social and mental state of transit. It revolves around the ritual character of the journey and the many aspects of human life it encompasses: anticipation, identity and transformation, and the contrast between the private sphere and “non-places” like public waiting rooms or halls of transit.
The occasion was the Ultima Festival, the music has been written especially by Henrik Hellstenius, and they also have director Kai Johnsen on board.
Ning has been working with the physical, theatrical and visual aspects of musical performance since the start in 1997. Their line-up is two drummers, a cellist and a flutist. They also make use of electronic tools and a wide variety of other sources of sound. In this concert-performance we meet four musicians who explore the relationship between the theatrical and sound by looking at objects, body and language as carriers of meaning on par with music.
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Concept/idea Ning Direction Kai Johnsen and Andy Smith, in collaboration with Ning
Music Henrik Hellstenius, in collaboration with Ning
Performers Maja Bugge, Erik S. Dæhlin, Tora Ferner Lange, Amund Sjølie Sveen
http://ning.no/
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Theatre productions:
Lise L.
By Liv Heløe and Kai Johnsen
Nathionaltheatret, Oslo 2005
Actor: Tone Danielsen
Director: Kai Johnsen
Music : Henrik Hellstenius
Rambuku
By Jon Fosse
Det Norske Teatret, Oslo 2006
Director: Kai Johnsen
Music: Henrik Hellstenius
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