Opera Philadelphia
Unholy Wars
Karim Sulayman
Raha Mirzadegan
John Taylor Ward
Mary Kouyoumdijan
Coral Dolphin
The recitation of the Crusades, through the music of Monteverdi’s Tancredi e Clorinda; the virtuosity of human emotion unexpectedly anticipated a global protest, and an international summit gathered on the objectionable military support of industry from institutions of power, and leaders of the economic world. In Sulayman’s Unholy Wars, Baroque and Middle Eastern folk music is alarmingly foreshadowing what would become known as, Media in the Time of Genocide.
Opera Philadelphia presented a meditative experience on stage in 2023, set to religious conflict in the period of the Crusades. Ultimately we are faced with this beauty, and confession of the narrator of the story in the program, allude to their own reality of the ‘other’. The eruption of the apartheid state of Jerusalem and the global stance by humanitarian activists against this Zionist naturalization into Palestine is startlingly real. A reluctance to speak out against the carnage, and this distance evoked by the Renaissance style of Monteverdi’s expressionism in the music evoked the Middle Eastern lands historically placed in modern history. FestivalO23, Unholy Wars, with its World premiere at the Spoleto Festival 2022, honorably staged this effervescent brutality in metaphor. The baroque installation was an epic use of a minimal set, (graphic projections, sand, buckets, rope, and water.)
Music composed by Mary Kouyoumdijan show influences of Middle Eastern folk music in the genre effectively interrupt, and apprehend the timeless story, Combat Tancredi e Clorinda. The direction of conceptualism in the classical music category deserves praise, and focuses on the relationship of the past, present, and future of humanity. Grammy nominated music by BEST CLASSICAL SOLO VOCAL ALBUM, Karim Sulayman narrates the twist of faith between lovers.
Raha Mirzadegan and John Taylor Ward portrayed the relationship of love-crossed, lovers in a twist of faith. Songs in French, Arabic, and Italian depicted the complexity of the geographical, and site-specificity of Middle Eastern culture.
“Flowers have appeared in our land”
A Multimedia experience, Coral Dolphin as dance captain added choreography. Dance silently framed the stage, the screen transitioned from a metropolis of attributes of urban design, an ancient architectural genius, and myth of urban centers and civilization, and the destruction in war, burning fires’ smoke. It drew in the smokey style a rush of horseback riders coming with purpose, that of the crusaders, and finally the ascension of Clorinda’s death, and her spirit moves up into heaven.
Tancredi thinking Clorinda to be the woman.
Exhausted and Breathless
“Angel returns to their hearts into his ear Instead of things, flee the fragrance oil and collapse.”
“That it rose to his heart and all anger died, not my body which fears nothing”
Ecstasy in the music felt more than an illustration in the mourning death of love. The Smokey stampede of crusaders, a maiden running away across the screen. The Crusades pose “the coming of societies historical delay to intellectual and political modernity,” (Mohamed Sabila: In the Contemporary Philosophical Condition.) The spirit of Clorinda ascending in the projection art by Kevork Mouad, and the warrior Tancredi courageous guilt ridden, until the fatal mistake. As Tancredi, played by Taylor Ward, killed the woman he loved in an epic story of unconditional love. Raha Mirzadegan plays this veiled woman-warrior, the lover and also the victim, Clorinda. She pardons Tancredi for this tragedy. The nature of their affection transform to a spirituality beyond expression. The paradoxical love and war, revealed two faith driven identities in human history, and Monteverdi’s expressionism was, “the changes of mind and mood, and greater development of musical means…” (Britannica.com/biography/claudio-monteverdi/Three-decades-in-Venice.) The baroque music reaches toward this renaissance in art, and folk traditions that transfer spiritual meaning over provincial concerns in UNHOLY WARS.
Sun and Sea, 2021
Contemporary Opera at the 2021 Philadelphia Fringe Festival composed by Lina Lapelytė, realized by Rugilė Barzdźiukaitė, and libretto by Viva Grainytė. It was like stepping onto a movie set, or visiting an exhibit at the zoo.