News Miloš Konvalinka

Amazingly, a new British opera will receive its stage premiere this September, an event to be celebrated at the best of times and particularly so in the current crisis.  The staging will take place in Lubljana, Slovenia where Beyond the Garden by Stephen McNeff and Aoife Mannix was commissioned by Slovenian Chamber Music Theatre (SKGG). The premiere, delayed from July 2020, takes place at the Cankarjev dom, the main arts complex in Ljubljana, on 4 September 2020, with Susan Bickley and Katja Konvalinka, conducted by Simon Dvoršak and in a production directed by Rocc (Rok Rappl), former artistic director of the Slovenian National Opera. Lasting around 70 minutes and written for two singers and five-piece chamber ensemble, the work explores the relationship between Alma Mahler and her daughter Manon, who died at the age of 18. McNeff describes the piece as a ghost story, and the Mannix's libretto explores the […]

Planet Hugill

2019-07-20 10:58:17

Beyond the Garden 

Alma Mahler in the garden of her housein Venice in 1929 Oltre il giardino (Beyond the Garden) is a hotel in Venice based in a house once belonged to Alma Mahler (she lived there in the 1920s, partly because it did have a garden). The hotel's English title Beyond the Garden has now given its name to a new opera by composer Stephen McNeff and librettist Aoife Mannix which is partly inspired by Alma Mahler and her relationship with her daugther Manon Gropius (who died from polio, contracted whilst staying with her mother in Venice, at the age of 18).Beyond the Garden is a work in progress, whose premiere takes place in June 2020 in Ljubljana, Slovenia, by Slovenian Chamber Music Theatre (SKGG) with Susan Bickley and Kaja Konvalinka singing the leading roles of Ottilia and Klara. Yesterday (19 July 2019), McNeff presented a fascinating workshop on the new opera, […]