“Waiting”. Peer Gynt From Solveig’s Point of View

2019 June 21, Friday, 19.00
Russian Drama Theatre of Lithuania, Vilnius

Performer
soloists: MARI ERIKSMOEN (soprano, Norway), STEIN SKJERVOLD (baritone; Norway, Lithuania)
VILNIUS Choir
LITHUANIAN NATIONAL SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
Conductor EIVIND GULLBERG JENSEN (Norway)
Original idea by director CALIXTO BIEITO (Catalonia, Spain)
Libretto by KARL OVE KNAUSGÅRD (Norway)
Video design by SARAH DERENDINGER (Switzerland)
Executive producer – ANDERS BEYER (Norway), the director of Bergen International Festival

Programme
“Waiting”. Peer Gynt From Solveig’s Point of View
Waiting is the hottest news in the vocal music repertoire. The production was initiated by an international network of music institutions – three festivals (Bergen Festival, Tivoli Festival “Summer Classical” and Vilnius Festival), Teatro Arriaga de Bilbao, Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra and the Iceland Symphony Orchestra. Dramatic concerto for soloists, choir and orchestraWaiting is also described as opera. It will receive the world premiere at the gala opening of the Bergen Festival on May 22, 2019, and in a month this monumental composition will come to Lithuania.

Generated by Catalan director Calixto Bieito and Norwegian novelist and librettist Karl Ove Knausgård, Waiting is an attempt at new approach to Norwegian epic hero Peer Gynt, namely from Solveig’s point of view. At the same time it is a testimony to relentless passion for Norwegian composer Grieg’s music. Knausgård has created a modern Solveig in a poetic novella, and this forms a backdrop for the performance. The theme of Waiting is the inescapable loneliness of the human being.

“Above me some crows came flying inland. More followed, and soon the air was black with birds. It was like a carpet of flesh, I thought, with beautiful shifting patterns in blue and black, which dissolved the next instant …”(Karl Ove Knausgård)

Information from the Lithuanian National Philharmonic Society