This event has been postponed.

The Cooperative presents an Australian premiere and a world premiere in a thrilling contemporary double bill.

Kaija Saariaho’s dramatically charged Émilie is a monodrama for soprano re-envisaged for a team of five artists, telling the story of extraordinary enlightenment scientist and scholar Émilie du Châtelet during her final and ultimately fatal pregnancy. This opera explores the role of women as scientists and scholars in the deeply personal universal context of childbirth, and dissects the inescapable complexities of life as women.

Designed for live performance with real time interaction between performed and pre-recorded elements, Felicity Wilcox’s Threading the Light (World Premiere) is a multimedia gem-like concert opera for string orchestra, singers and percussion, electronic surround sound and images. The title refers to the universal phenomenon of ritual, a constant in human culture designed to transcend worldly concerns. The work features surround diffusion effects and delay and spectral processing that invite us to be drawn into this sculptural work structured in four movements named after elements commonly associated with ritual practices: I Light, II Water, III Blood, and IV Fire. Text for the work has been sourced from prayers and contemplative writings across a broad range of faiths. Evocative, haunting, beautiful, and compelling, it’s a pertinent and cathartic work for our world today.

When: June 3, 4 2022 | 7.30PM

Where: Pitt St Uniting Church, 264 Pitt St, Sydney

Émilie

Music Director: Leonard Weiss

Director: Lucy Scott

Émilie du Châtelet - Elizabeth Cooper

Joanna Dionis Ross

Kirralee Hillier

Rachel Mink

Xiaoxu Aleta Shang

Threading the Light

Music Director: Joanna Drimatis

Director: Lucy Scott

Soloists - Katrina Mackenzie

Janine Harris

Brendan McRae

All profits taken from admission will support organisations working for peace and with victims of war.

Pay as you feel. Come as you are.

We look forward to seeing you soon.