An opera about Palestine
The Sea from writer and director Irum Fazal and composers Laila Arafah and Elif Nur Karlıdağ is a modern opera about Palestine, with sung and spoken English and Arabic intertwined with European and Middle Eastern instruments. The Sea holds up threads of human story against a backdrop of devastation: a little girl cannot find her mother, and her mother searches for her every day. Loss, memory and hope drive us towards the water's edge as we search for a moment of peace.
Feargal Hylton’s musical direction creates an atmospheric journey of longing, where what is barely noticed swells to acute sensation and back again. A dream of thought, half-thought and imagined past confronted by unbearable reality is told to us by Palestinian sopranos Dima Bawab and Nour Darwish, tenor Mark Bonney and chamber orchestra, conducted by Gabriella Teychenné.
The Sea is a Once Arts production supported by Arts Council England, and is part of Shubbak Festival.
