An online trailer has dropped for the upcoming opera Orson Rehearsed.
The work, conceived and written by Daron Hagen, and based on the life of Orson Welles will debut at the Studebaker Theater in Chicago on September 15-16, 2018.
Hagen is a prolific composer of acoustic and electro-acoustic music for the concert hall and stage. He is also a stage director, conductor, librettist, essayist, clinician, and collaborative pianist. Described as a “composer born to write operas” (Chicago Tribune) whose music is “dazzling, unsettling, exuberant, and heroic” (The New Yorker), his opera Amelia was described as “one of the 20 best operas of the 21st century” by Opera News.
In Orson Rehearsed, Welles is performed by Robert Orth, Robert Frankenberry, and Omar Mulero of the New Mercury Collective, in association with Atlas Arts Media, and the Fifth House Ensemble. Other vocalists include Carol Greif Schuele (Marlene Dietrich), Gilda Lyons (Rita Hayworth) and Melisa Bonetti (Paola Mori Welles).
The work is described a “70-minute multi-media Joycean stream of consciousness dreamscape comprised of the Zuzu’s petals-like memory shards of life streaming through the mind of American filmmaker, actor, activist, and visual artist Orson Welles during the last hour of his life. Welles is portrayed by three singers, accompanied by musicians and performed live to three synchronized 70-minute montages of visual images that correspond to musical and textual motives in the piece.”
A three-minute selection, Consider the Chimes, from Orson Rehearsed can be heard at www.daronhagen.com/
The trailer for the production is embedded below:
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