László Tihanyi: Fehér rózsa (White Rose) / Vörös Izzás (Red Glow) – premiere

László Tihanyi: Fehér rózsa (White Rose)

Performed by: Gábor Máté, Andrea Fullajtár – prose, Andrea Meláth, Krisztián Cser – voice

Featuring: Péter Szűcs, Csaba Pálfi – clarinet, Ditta Rohmann, Janka Jámbor – cello, Zsolt Fejérvári – double bass,

Libretto: László Tihanyi

Director: Gábor Máté

Conductor: László Tihanyi

László Tihanyi: Vörös izzás (Red Glow)

Performed by: Andrea Fullajtár – prose, Á la cARTe Chamber Choir (choirmaster: György Philipp), Budapest Dance Theatre

Featuring: Gergely Ittzés – flute, Péter Szűcs – clarinet, Gábor Eckhardt – piano, Ditta Rohmann – cello

Libretto: László Tihanyi, with the use of 14 medieval Japanese haikus and a chapter from the Lotus Sutra

Choreography: Béla Földi

Director: Gábor Máté

Conductor: László Tihanyi

László Tihanyi, the composer of Genitrix, an opera performed in Bordeaux and Budapest, now presents two musical pieces for the stage, which are difficult to characterize with the traditional concepts of opera. Their genre is usually described as instrumental theatre or stage music, a form that emerged in the 20th century from a fusion of concert, theatre and dance.

The plot of White Rose concerns the drama of a family, with “the actors reciting excerpts from diaries or letters, which thus outline the action. The singers sing snatches of these texts, a few words and turns of phrases. This was meant to illustrate the two voices of the human soul, the external and the internal one,” says the composer.

“Japanese culture has had a great impression on me,” he said apropos of Red Glow. “I detect a likeable symbiosis of tradition and modernity in contemporary Japan which I find exemplary. This also informs day-to-day human relations: rather than smothering normal human behaviour, the omnipresent ritualism enriches it.”