433 by John Cage (1952), OPHELIA live

The first ever performance of this seminal 1952 work by John Cage by a mezzosoprano with theorbo accompaniment. The authentic 15th century manor house of Qvidja Gård provided OPHELIA with a suitably HIP setting and acoustics for this groundbreaking live performance. Typically for us, Sanna kept faithfully the agreedupon tempo, but Tuomas, carried away by the excitement of unrehearsed live recording, chose a faster one. Luckily we were using the now out of print First Tacet Edition (Peters 6777) of the work, which states that the work may last any length of time, and not the more strictly prescriptive Kremen Manuscript (1953) we had previously considered because of our preference for earlier sources the original Woodstock manuscript (August 1952) now being lost. After we left, the flies in the window began another performance of indeterminate duration. Performed by OPHELIA: Sanna Kola, mezzosoprano Tuomas Kourula, theorbo.