You won't want to miss these three operas by women during Operadagen Rotterdam

Friday, May 12 starts the twelfth edition of Opera Days Rotterdam. The 10-day festival is under the title Lost & Found on the theme of current refugee issues. I selected three operas by Calliope Tsoupaki, Annelies van Parys and Claron McFadden, strong women whose work deserves to be heard (and seen).

The fear of the unknown is as old as mankind - achievements are cherished, strangers viewed with suspicion. In their search for a 'new home', many leave their familiar world and cross literal and symbolic borders to build a new - and hopefully better - existence elsewhere.

Do we dare to venture into undiscovered territory? Do we arrive at our destination or do we get lost? Do we isolate ourselves from the rest of the world, or do we recognise ourselves in the stranger other? These are the questions posed by composers Tsoupaki and Van Parys and soprano Claron McFadden. All three chose a particular angle.

Calliope Tsoupaki: Fortress Europe

The elderly lady Europa wants at all costs to prevent even one asylum seeker from entering her comfortable little world. - Though as a young woman on the back of supreme god Zeus, she came to Europe from Syria, where she had to build a new life as a foreigner. Her son is a politician who keeps the gate to Europe firmly closed. Face to face with boat refugee Amar, however, he starts to have doubts.

Tsoupaki composed heartbreakingly beautiful music to accompany it, with spicy, Arabic-tinged choral passages and plaintive melodies of an oboe. She makes the feelings of melancholy for the loss of hearth and home poignant. Too bad about the dry and unambiguous libretto, which leaves nothing to our imagination. But thanks to the wonderful music and the striking staging Fortress Europe still a performance to shed a tear.

Annelies van Parys: The Channel

At The Channel by Flemish Annelies van Parys, a refugee wants to swim across the Channel, into a new future. On the chalk cliffs opposite, he encounters a transsexual woman who wants to end her life. A surprising dialogue ensues between the two: their fates turn out to be more strongly linked than thought.

Their spoken conversation finds its mirror in the music of Annelies van Parys. She set songs to a recently recovered theatre text by William Shakespeare. It describes a sheriff who wants to prevent his citizens from lynching a group of refugees. A singer, as 'commentator', places the monologues in a broader, more universal framework. She is alternately accompanied by guitar or lute, plucked instruments that were popular in Shakespeare's time.

Claron McFadden: Nightshade: aubergine

Pronounced originality is the approach of American-Dutch soprano Claron McFadden. In Nightshade: aubergine she explores the common roots of our diverse cultures. To this end, she follows the route the popular purple vegetable took from the Middle East to our kitchen table.

She visited five countries around the Mediterranean. Together with locals, she made a local aubergine dish and rehearsed a traditional song. McFadden presents her experiences in the form of a theatrical and culinary concert. In this way, she makes longing for identity in an ever-changing world palpable.

Behind the musicians, film images are projected by Lisa Tahon, who followed McFadden on her journey. Gradually, it becomes clear that there is no single origin, only an infinite number of branches and nodes. Moreover, we turn out to have more in common than we think.

Aubergine snacks will be served at the concert. - A performance to make your mouth water.

What and where.

Opera Days Rotterdam, from 12 to 21 May, info and tickets: www.operadagenrotterdam.nl

(This blog is an adaptation of an article previously published in Opzij magazine)