BETWEEN

Between will be premiered at the Finnish National Opera in August 2022

Ideals and deeds, mind and body, music and theatre – unexpected and head
spinning spaces open up in the border areas of these themes. We follow a
character in an apocalyptic world, to whom the veil of reality rises through
words, sounds, and images.

Kaija Saariaho‘s first stage work, Study for Life, had its only performance in
February 1981. Now the new generation is bringing its own interpretation of
this enigmatic first step towards opera, combining it with a stage version of
the violin concerto Graal Théâtre.

The new generation is also represented by composers Sebastian Hilli and Matias
Vestergård with their poetic visions of soundscapes. The combinations of the
four works ascend to an eloquent premiere, an opera of silence and untamed
forces.

Music: Kaija Saariaho, Matias Vestergård, Sebastian Hilli

Production: Music theatre company La Chambre aux échos

Direction and video: Aleksi Barrière
Stage and lighting design: Étienne Exbrayat
Audio and video technology: Jean-Baptiste Barrière
Visual Arts (Study for Life): Martin Atanasov

Conductor: Clément Mao-Takacs
Actor: Thomas Kellner
Soprano: Tuuli Lindeberg
Solo Violin: Peter Herresthal

Orchestra: Secession Orchestra

Performance production in Finland: Teatro Productions
Producer: Kaisa Näreranta

The workshop version of Study for Life / Graal Théâtre was presented at the
Viitasaari Music Time Festival in 2019.

Text translations: Aleksi Barrière

Programme

Study for Life (1981, rev. 2019)
Music: Kaija Saariaho
Text: Thomas Stearns Eliot – The Hollow Men

…through its darkness (2019, rev. 2021)
Matias Vestergård

Peach (2019, rev. 2021)
Sebastian Hilli

Graal Théâtre (1994, rev.  2018)
Music: Kaija Saariaho
Text: Aleksi Barrière – Not A Knight