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Lines of Blue Light
Kaija Saariaho's opera 'L'amour de loin',
live in HD from New York Metropolitan Opera,
impresses MARIA NOCKIN
When the Metropolitan Opera stages a work, it sometimes produces a show that few other companies can equal. In a production by Robert Lepage, designed by Michael Curry with landscape images by Lionel Arnould and lighting by Kevin Adams, Kaija Saariaho's tonally grounded but not linearly melodic opera L'amour de loin was spellbinding when seen at the Met.
Finnish conductor Susanna Mälkki held her disparate forces to strict tempi so that Saariaho's Baroque ornaments and medieval modal harmony intermingled subtly with her unique twentieth century overtones and spikes of dissonance.
Like the leading female character in the opera, both composer and librettist know what it is to be far from the countries of their birth...
Copyright © 18 December 2016
Maria Nockin,
Arizona USA
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