Du Yun OPERAS Zolle (2005), Angel’s Bone (2015), Sweet Land (2020), In Our Daughter’s Eyes (2021)
Angel’s Bone
A chamber opera in one act (2015) 2017 Pulitzer Prize in Music Libretto by Royce Vavrek Duration: 1 hour 27 minutes Premiere: January 2016, Prototype Festival, Choir of Trinity Wall Street, NOVUS, New York
“Angel’s Bone is a truly groundbreaking work...” Lauren Ishida, I Care if You Listen
cast
MRS. X.E.: Dramatic Soprano or Mezzo-soprano MR. X.E.: Baritone. Should have a powerful range, and also sing cabaret-style BOY ANGEL: Lyric Tenor. Should have a very wide range; low register can be mostly sung with sound effect GIRL ANGEL: Female Voice (preferably with a punk sensibility). Should be a voice that can carry out a punk song, who also coocoos well MAN ON TV: Male Voice from the choir THE FEMALE CUSTOMER: Mezzo-soprano from the choir CUSTOMERS: from the choir NEIGHBORS: from the choir TV HOST: from the choir Mixed Choir: at least 8 singers and a conductor.
ensemble
1(afl,bfl).1(ca).1.0/0.1.0.1/perc(dmkit)/lu/vn.va.vc (all instruments amplified); prerecorded audio
expanded orchestration
2(II:pic).2(II:ca).2(II:bcl).2(II:cbn)/2.2.1+btbn.1/perc/str; prerecorded audio
synopsis
Angel’s Bone follows the plight of two angels whose nostalgia for earthly delights has, mysteriously, brought them back to our world. They are found battered and bruised from their long journey by a man and his wife. Mr. and Mrs. X.E. set out to nurse the wounded angels back to health: they bathe them, wash the dirt from their nails…then lock them in a room and decide to exploit these magical beings for wealth and personal gains. Angel’s Bone melds chamber music, theatre, punk rock, opera, cabaret, and electronics, exploring the dark effects and motivations behind modern-day slavery and the trafficking industry.
press
“Disturbing, powerful and original…” — Anne Midgette, The Washington Post
“An appallingly good work…Ms. Du’s music obeys only her own omnivorous tastes and assured dramatic instincts.” — Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim, The New York Times “Angel’s Bone is a fully realized vision. Spare yet complex, the work is a wholly original parable on the danger of greed. The work of composer Du Yun ranges across musical genres, from medieval polyphony to punk, in a way that interweaves and juxtaposes the sacred and the profane without ever degrading to pastiche.” — Natalie Axton, Hyperallergic
Sweet Land An opera in two tracks (2020)
Best New Opera 2021, Music Critics Association of North America
Music by Du Yun and Ravon Chacon, libretto by Aja Couchois Duncan and Douglas Kearney Duration: Feast Track 60 minutes, Train Track 62 minutes Premiere: February 2020, The Industry, Los Angeles State Historic Park, Los Angeles, CA
feast cast
COYOTE WIINDIGO TOTAA’AR MAKWA GRANDFATHER FATHER SON JIMMY GIN
ensemble
train cast COYOTE GUIDE BOW DRUM CAPTAIN PREACHER RIFLE SCRIBE
2(II=sx).0.2(2sx).0/0.1.1.2/3perc/2gtr/2pf/str (1.1.2.2.2)
synopsis
The Arrivals wash up on the shore. They make contact with another civilization they call “the Hosts.” And from there, the story splinters, following diverging perspectives. There are two Sweet Land “tracks.” Each track features a different story, with different music and different cast members. Both tracks offer a complete experience and feature music by both composers and both writers.
press
“Sweet Land astonishes...” — Mark Swed, Los Angeles Times, on its premiere Then there is the score by the composers Raven Chacon and Du Yun. Here is how you can tell this is real opera — its bones, blood, sinew, skin and consciousness all in the music. The experience that seemed more than complete outside was that only because all along it was the score that gave everything else meaning.” — Mark Swed, Los Angeles Times, on its recording “Chaotic, conflicted, implacably honest.” — Alex Ross, The New Yorker “An ambitious, sprawling, ‘gut punch’ of an opera…” — Music Critics Association of North America “It’s inspiring to hear this amount of innovation and commitment in a heartfelt work of edgy opeatic activsim, even if there’s a fair amount of cacophony and betwilderment along the way.” — Joshua Rosenblum, Opera News
In Our Daughter’s Eyes A monodrama (2021) Developed in collaboration with Nathan Gunn; libretto by Michael Joseph McQuilken Duration: 1 hour 15 minutes Premiere: April 2022, Los Angeles Opera Off Grand
cast
FATHER-TO-BE: Baritone
ensemble
cl(sx), tpt, perc(electronics), egtr(bgtr), vn, vc
synopsis
Told through the perspective of a new father, In Our Daughter’s Eyes shows the journey of the protagonist as he wrestles with truly becoming a man that his daughter would be proud of. He imparts passages from the journal he keeps — a gift for his unborn daughter — as the moments of this journey unfold before him. The story traces his wife’s joyful and fraught pregnancy, the legacy of the family’s past, and his personal demons that he vows to vanquish before assuming the role of a father. Along the way, mounting complications take the story through unexpected and sobering turns that test our flawed hero as he discovers a strength of self and purpose that he never imagined possible.
press
“Du Yun’s complex, seething textures helped Gunn to achieve a grittily detailed emotional realism of a kind I’ve seldom witnessed on an opera stage..” — Alex Ross, The New Yorker
Zolle A chamber opera in ten chapters (2005) Libretto by the composer Duration: 55 minutes Premiere: October 2005, The International Contemporary Ensemble and Du Yun
cast
THE WANDER WOMAN GHOST: Narrator* THE SAME WANDER WOMAN VOICE: Female voice* THE LAND-WATCHER MAN: Tenor** *The Narrator and the Female voice are the same character **The Tenor can be live or recorded
ensemble
1(afl).0.0.0.asx(tsx)/perc/[recording]/vn.va.vc
synopsis
In Zolle (It., big chunk of earth), a dead woman is a land-watcher. She wanders through the shadowy space between memory and reality, tracing the lines of her identity through the land she once walked: an immigrant in death as in life. In her haunted travels between the worlds of life and the afterlife, she is unable to choose between the living and the dead, at a loss to let go of either. Finally, with her sorrows, solitudes, and peacefulness, she lets go of both, turning into a part of the earth.
press
“Fanciful, allegorical and open to interpretations personal and political...” — Joshua Barone, The New York Times “This…shimmering labyrinthine evening condenses into a miracle from which only the heartfelt applause brings you back to reality.” — Urs Mattenberger, Luzerner Zeitung “…from the direction, the stage and costume design to the music and the texts which enriches the music and vice versa.” — SRF Regionaljournal Zentralschweiz
photos
Cover: Angel’s Bone at Staatstheater Augsburg, photo by Jan-Pieter Fuhr Angel’s Bone at Staatstheater Augsburg, photo by Jan-Pieter Fuhr
Sweet Land at The Industry, Los Angeles, CA, photo by Casey Kringlen In Our Daughter’s Eyes at Los Angeles Opera
Zolle at Luzern Theatre, costume and photo by Roscha A. Säidow
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Du Yun works at the intersection of opera, orchestra, theater, cabaret, oral tradition, public performances, electronics, visual arts, and noise. Du Yun’s second opera, Angel’s Bone (libretto by Royce Vavrek), won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize in Music. She was nominated for a Grammy Award in the Best Classical Composition category for her work Air Glow. Her collaborative opera Sweet Land with Raven Chacon (for opera company The Industry) was the 2021 Best New Opera by the North America Critics Association. Four of her feature studio albums were named The New Yorker’s Notable Recordings of the Year (in 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 respectively). She was a founding member of the International Contemporary Ensemble. Du Yun is Professor of Composition at the Peabody Institute, and Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music.