An Index of Metals - Sydney Chamber Opera & Ensemble Offspring

Overview

Carriageworks is teaming up with the Sydney Chamber Orchestra and Ensemble Offspring to bring Fausto Romitelli’s An Index of Metals to Australia for the first time. The cult Italian composer, who completed the work just before he died in 2004 (aged 41), described it as an “electric poem”. The ambitious piece draws on a huge range of influences, from rave parties to ancient initiation rites.

Running the show is Helpmann Award-winning director Kip Williams, (STC’s Suddenly Last Summer and Macbeth, SCO’s The Lighthouse), known for his brave, creative aesthetics, while Australian-American soprano Jane Sheldon (Exil) is taking the lead.

“Designer Elizabeth Gadsby and I have responded to the complex emotional tapestry of the score and libretto by depicting a simple portrait of a woman processing the demise of a relationship,” says Williams. “Romitelli's composition and [libretto writer Kenka] Lekovich's poetry offer a sense of descent into paralysis. Our staging explores the protagonist's break down as she struggles to reconcile her bliss-filled desire with the pain of her reality.”

Want more operatic goodness? Read our interview with Sydney Chamber Opera co-founder Pierce Wilcox.