Creation of the World

  • Author, music: Joseph Haydn
  • Director: Ilja Racek
  • Set and costume design: Dana Hávová
  • Movement cooperation: Jiří Pokorný
  • Conductors: Oliver Dohnányi, Fabrizio Da Ros
  • Soloists:
  • Soprano – Gabriel, Eva: Leigh Michelow, Karolína Janů
  • Tenor: Uriel – Joseph Dahdah, Tomasz Tracz, Vincenc Ignác Novotný
  • Baritone: Rafael, Adam – Jan Kukal, Michal Marhold
  • Guide: Daniel Volný
  • Children’s Choirs: children of primary schools (Základní škola Ostrava-Poruba, J. Valčíka 4411, příspěvková organizace, Základní škola Opava, Vrchní 19, příspěvková organizace, Základní škola a Mateřská škola Leoše Janáčka Hukvaldy, příspěvková organizace Hukvaldy 162, 739 46 Hukvaldy)

Creation of the World is part of the international project Let’s Sing Oratorio Music!, whose main feature is active audience participation: children and young people participate during the performance by singing the choral parts of the oratorio accompanied by the SDO orchestra and choir, while the soloists are the winners of the Sacred Music International Competition 2020.

Haydn’s oratorio, Creation, is divided into seven days and three movements, in which first light, heaven and earth, sea and mountains, and everything else rise from chaos to finally Adam and Eve. The three archangels Gabriel (soprano), Uriel (tenor) and Raphael (bass) comment on and praise God’s work. In the last section, Adam and Eve join them and together they praise the miracle of creation. Haydn’s music, both austere and naive in style, can evocatively evoke the initial chaos and violent storms, the fiery lightning and roaring thunder, the light snowflakes and the gurgling stream, and its refinement places this oratorio among his masterpieces. Its performance in history has always been and continues to be a feast. However, when the audience applauded the composer enthusiastically at one of the performances, Haydn is said to have raised his index finger modestly: ‘Not from me – it all comes from up there!

Premiere: 5 December 2021

Program

Slezské Divadlo Opava Buy Sun 05.12. 19:00
Slezské Divadlo Opava Buy Tue 07.12. 19:00
Slezské Divadlo Opava Buy Wed 08.12. 19:00
Slezské Divadlo Opava Buy Fri 10.12. 19:00
Slezské Divadlo Opava Buy Sat 11.12. 18:00
Slezské Divadlo Opava Buy Thu 16.12. 19:00
Slezské Divadlo Opava Buy Fri 17.12. 19:00
Slezské Divadlo Opava Buy Sat 18.12. 19:00