World Premiere of Anorexia Sacra by
Danish composer Line Tjørnhøj
(HOUSTON, TX ) Opera Vista, winner of the 2010 Houston Press MasterMind Award, announces the 2010 Opera Vista Festival, featuring the 3rd Annual Vista Competition for New Opera, will take place March 20th-27th.
This year’s festival will feature the world premiere of the winning opera from the 2009 Opera Vista Festival, Anorexia Sacra by Line Tjørnhøj. Line couples the plight of a young woman suffering from anorexia with the writings of the 13th century nun Claire of Assisi.
In her work, Line Tjørnhøj strives to confront this tangible human caused “pain” and transforms that energy into a reconciling and creative musical expression. Human suffering can take so many forms and the only “instrument” that is truly capable of displaying this wide spectrum of emotions, is the human voice – doing both, staging the drama, forming the words and simultaneously bringing comfort and healing. This is possible when singers dare to extend their vocal expression beyond pure singing and integrate basic authentic sounds of their voices into the expression: sounds that normally express extreme conditions such as pain, great joy, satisfaction and devotion. This is how the drama – Anorexia Sacra – comes to life on stage.
The libretto of Anorexia Sacra consists of extracts from Clare of Assisi’s letters and other medieval writings that were blended with Line Tjørnhøj’s lyrics. She got her inspiration from the writings on the proana websites and attempted to build a poetic bridge, and a textual collage, respectively, spanning more than 800 years of time. The libretto is especially pointing out the powerless situation parents and treatment initiatives found themselves in when confronting the enormous power and will of self-starvation. It displays the aspects of thoughts and feelings expressed through compulsive self-destructive behavior. But mostly it is the story of a father who watches his beloved daughter starving herself to death.
