Newsletter

News about the schedule Personal recommendations Special offers ... Stay well informed!

Subscribe to our newsletter

Subscribe to our Newsletter and receive 25% off your next ticket purchase.

* Mandatory field





Newsletter

Schedule - Deutsche Oper Berlin

Skip Media Container

Opening night

New Scenes VII

A Chamber Opera Triptych by Zara Ali, Haukur þór Harðarson, Huihui Cheng

27
Sunday
April
20:00 - 22:00
€ 25.00 / reduced € 10.00
Buy tickets
Free choice of seats.
Information about the work

Work 1
Chamber opera by Zara Ali
with a libretto by Hannah Dübgen

Work 2
Chamber opera by Haukur þór Harðarson
with a libretto by Sophie Fetokaki

Work 3
Chamber opera by Huihui Cheng
with a libretto by Giuliana Kiersz

World premiere: 27 April 2025 in the Tischlerei of the Deutsche Oper Berlin

approx. 2 hours 15 minutes / one interval

In German with German surtitles

recommended from 15 years
Share this post
Cast
Chamber opera 1
  • Composition, Concept
  • Text
  • Director
    Sergei Morozov
  • Singing and playing
    Studierende der Hochschule fur Musik Hanns Eisler
Chamber opera 2
  • Composition, Concept
  • Text
    Sophie Fetokaki
  • Director
    Anna Sofie Brandsborg
  • Singing and playing
    Studierende der Hochschule fur Musik Hanns Eisler
Chamber opera 3
  • Composition, Concept
  • Text
  • Director
    Ruth Asralda
  • Singing and playing
    Studierende der Hochschule fur Musik Hanns Eisler
Our thanks to our partners

International Composition Competition of the Deutsche Oper Berlin in co-operation with the Hanns Eisler School of Music Berlin

27
Sunday
April
20:00 - 22:00
€ 25.00 / reduced € 10.00
Buy tickets
Free choice of seats.
Cast
Chamber opera 1
  • Composition, Concept
  • Text
  • Director
    Sergei Morozov
  • Singing and playing
    Studierende der Hochschule fur Musik Hanns Eisler
Chamber opera 2
  • Composition, Concept
  • Text
    Sophie Fetokaki
  • Director
    Anna Sofie Brandsborg
  • Singing and playing
    Studierende der Hochschule fur Musik Hanns Eisler
Chamber opera 3
  • Composition, Concept
  • Text
  • Director
    Ruth Asralda
  • Singing and playing
    Studierende der Hochschule fur Musik Hanns Eisler
the content

What does a future look like in which researchers aren’t just creating with artificial intelligence, but have also learned to copy people at the computer? This scenario was put forth by economist Robin Hanson in his book The Age of Em – Work, Love and Life when Robots Rule the Earth. Composer Zara Ali from Memphis, Tennessee is currently working on bringing Hanson’s physical-digital hybrids to the stage in what she describes as a sort of “spherical installation” that will place the audience in the perceptual world of these “Ems”.

Together with author Hannah Dübgen, Ali is one of the three teams working on next-generation musical theatre for the seventh edition of the NEW SCENES. “We want to make something truly special, not the typical opera,” says the 28-year-old composer. Ali, who studied philosophy at Columbia University parallel to her musical education, frequently experiments with electronics, and works on interdisciplinary projects with string quartets and dancers – and now, for the first time, at an opera house.

Huihui Cheng, who attended a school for musically gifted children in Beijing at the age of 14, is particularly interested in the performative potential of compositions. She refers to her past works as “theatrically expanded pieces of music”, such as “Me Du Ça” – part of a series on Greek mythology. Cheng worked with a designer to change the Medusa singer’s hair from snakes into tubes that can be played like flutes. Like Ali, Cheng is interested in technological advancements and the possibilities these bring to the stage. She recalls recently seeing a drone at an Offenbach opera, emphasising that the goal of such methods should be “to convey the beauty of the music and the eternity of emotions”. An opera like the Deutsche Oper Berlin, she says, offers the ideal conditions for exploring innovative approaches.

Haukur Þór Harðarson, from Iceland and living in Berlin, co-founder of the composition collective Errata, thinks it’s exciting when New Theatre artists “challenge themselves with experimental methods”. For example, when they “subvert the idea of storytelling, or do away with a story altogether and focus on atmosphere or a state of being”. For NEW SCENES he will work with librettist Sophie Fetokaki, and is already compiling sound ideas. He hopes that the project will help him “meet potential future collaborators”.

What issues is the latest generation of artists focusing on? What are the burning questions that will be addressed on stage? What scenes, texts, sounds and images will these require? To answer these questions, the Tischlerei at the Deutsche Oper Berlin is being transformed into the future laboratory of NEW SCENES. As part of an international competition in summer 2023, three teams consisting of a composer and an author were selected to write a new piece of musical theatre to be debuted at the Tischlerei over a three-part evening. The three pieces will be performed, sung and produced by students at the School of Music Hanns Eisler Berlin. This marks the seventh time that the school has partnered with the Deutsche Oper Berlin on NEW SCENES.

Our articles on the subject

Kickstarter for musical theatre
Enter Onepager
1

slide_title_1

slide_description_1

slide_headline_2
2

slide_title_2

slide_description_2

slide_headline_3
3

slide_title_3

slide_description_3

slide_headline_4
4

slide_title_4

slide_description_4

Create / edit OnePager
05
DEC

Adventskalender in der Tischlerei: Das 5. Fensterchen

Today in the Tischlerei: ‘Rossini, Liszt and more’
with Kangyoon Shine Lee (tenor) and Songyeon Catarina Kim (piano)
5pm / Tischlerei
Duration: approx. 25 minutes / free admission


The evening begins with musical declarations of love: love is illuminated in all its facets – from the idealised, the yearning to the devoted and the melancholy – in three songs by Franz Liszt and an aria from Rossini's IL BARBIERE DI SIVIGLIA. Franz Liszt's ‘Enfant, si j'etais roi’ (‘Child, if I were king’) and ‘Oh! Quand je dors’ (‘Oh! When I sleep’) are settings of poems by Victor Hugo. In the first, the beloved is given everything imaginable – but it can never be enough. The second poem describes a nocturnal vision of the beloved, who appears like an angel, kisses the sleeping person and fills them with heavenly love. Liszt's ‘Liebestraum Nr. 3’ (‘Oh dear, as long as you can love’) is one of a series of three songs that Liszt later arranged in a purely instrumental form and which became emblematic of romantic piano music. The original text was written by Ferdinand Freiligrath and deals with the transience of love and the resulting need to cherish and cultivate it in the here and now. You will hear the Korean pianist Songyeon Catarina Kim at the piano. She then lovingly accompanies our ensemble member Kangyoon Shine Lee in an aria that he will sing again on our main stage from 31 March 2025, when he takes on the role of Count Almaviva in Katharina Thalbach's production of Rossini's IL BARBIERE DI SIVIGLIA: the cavatina ‘Ecco, ridente in cielo’. In it, Almaviva sings about the beauty of the morning and his ardent love for Rosina – it is a lyrical and romantic beginning to an otherwise predominantly comedic opera. It is followed by the song ‘La danza’ from Rossini's collection of songs ‘Les soirées musicales’, published about 20 years later, which describes the joyful hustle and bustle of a Neapolitan festival. The musical basis for this song is the tarantella, a fast, rhythmic folk dance from southern Italy. The programme will conclude with a contemplative Christmas favourite, ‘O Holy Night’.

Lyric tenor Kangyoon Shine Lee was born in Seoul. He first graduated from the Korea National University of Arts before studying with Kammersänger Prof. Roman Trekel at the Hanns Eisler School of Music Berlin from 2022. In 2021, Kangyoon Shine Lee won the Belvedere Competition and received an engagement at the Deutsche Oper Berlin. He made his house debut on 27 December 2022 as Almaviva in Rossini's IL BARBIERE DI SIVIGLIA and also sang in DAS WUNDER DER HELIANE. In the 2024/25 season, he will be part of the ensemble here at the theatre and can be heard in roles such as Tamino in Mozart's MAGIC FLUTE and the children's version THE FAIRY TALE OF THE MAGIC FLUTE, as Count von Lerma / DON CARLO, Cavalier Belfiore / IL VIAGGIO A REIMS, Malcolm / MACBETH, Walther von der Vogelweide / TANNHÄUSER and Pang / TURANDOT.

The South Korean pianist Songyeon Catarina Kim studied piano at Kyunghee University in Seoul. She has won numerous Korean and international competitions. Since 2021, she has been studying Lied interpretation with Prof. Wolfram Rieger at the Hanns Eisler School of Music Berlin. She is currently studying chamber music with Prof. Wolfram Rieger as part of her concert exam. During her studies, she was a répétiteur in lessons with KS Prof. Roman Trekel, Prof. Anna Korondi, KS Prof. Ewa Wolak, Prof. Martin Bruns and Prof. Christine Schäfer, as well as a répétiteur in masterclasses with KS Brigitte Fassbaender and KS Prof. Thomas Quasthoff. She has also worked as a répétiteur for scenic instruction at the Immling Festival, the Darmstadt Theatre and the Erfurt Theatre. In the 2024/25 season, she will work as a répétiteur at IMMMERMEEEHR at the Deutsche Oper Berlin.