Experience an exciting cross-border collaboration on the famous English opera ‘Dido & Aeneas’ in Bengaluru this weekend
English composer Henry Purcell’s Dido & Aeneas , based on Book IV of Roman poet Virgil’s epic The Aeneid, is all set to be the weekend’s talk of the town as Legato School Of Music, Bangalore International Centre and The Lewis Foundation of Classical Ballet all come together to narrate this tale of ‘love, passion, betrayal and death’. We chat with Sweden-based opera singer Maria Forsström (who will be essaying the role of Dido) and Swedish conductor Sofia Winiarski.
Our discussion begins with Maria Forsström, “I would say that if you’ve never been to an opera performance before, I think Purcell’s Dido & Aeneas is the ideal way to start because it’s very short. It’s like one hour. It’s got short solos, duets and short choral pieces in it. It’s easily accessible for a person who is not used to opera. It’s colourful. It’s easy to absorb the art form and then from then on you want to go on to longer pieces. I would advise any new beginner to opera to go for the show,” she says.
The literary work is known to not exist in its entirety with parts of the score, including the Prologue, the end of the Act II Grove scene and various dances being lost. We learn from Maria that the absence of these missing pieces would not affect the audience’s understanding of the larger part of the opera that will be staged. “The thing is, this Prologue doesn’t belong to the rest of the opera in terms of the narrative because it’s an idealised and quite two-dimensional characteristic of a ‘shepherd and shepherdess’ play — which is a type of emblematic entertainment form in European baroque. France had similar kinds of emblematic entertainment pieces with roles like the dawn, night, shepherd and shepherdess and it was always about love, spring and so on. Those were not integrated parts of the performance per se. So, this could be lifted out as just lovely entertainment. Also, we put it before the opera, so we’ve put it in as a way of warming up people,” she explains. Performing an interesting twist is the South Indian percussions that have been added into the arrangement. “The audience will see a chenda alongside the other instruments! This has never been done in Europe,” Maria adds. Additionally, ballet performers from The Lewis Foundation of Classical Ballet will also add to the experience of this retelling of Dido & Aeneas.
Read More : Dido & Aeneas: A timeless tale of love, betrayal and more comes alive in Bengaluru
