Today, the Royal Opera Theater in Copenhagen presents the world première of Snedronningen (The Snow Queen), an opera composed by Hans Abrahamsen with a libretto based on Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale.
It is the composer's first opera.
The children, Gerda and Kay, are close friends. They live across an alley from each other and happily chat, play, and tend a rose which is growing in their backyard. The children are content until tragedy strikes: Kay’s eye and heart are pierced with fragments of a mirror, and the loving boy Kay then vanishes. The Snow Queen has put him under her spell and taken him to her palace of snow and ice. It is up to Gerda to find him and free him. (reproduced from the Music Sales Classical website)The cast includes soprano Sofie Elkjær Jensen (Gerda), mezzo Elisabeth Jansson (Kay), mezzo Johanne Bock, bass baritone Johan Reuter (Snow Queen), soprano Sibylle Glosted (Princess) and tenor Gert Henning-Jensen (Prince). Michael Boder conducts the Kongelige Kapel and the Kongelige Operakor. Francisco Negrin directs.
The performance should last about 2 hours, including one interval.
According the Music Sales Classical website, the required orchestra is the following :
- 4 flutes, 3 oboes, 4 clarinets, 3 bassoons ;
- 6 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, 1 tuba ;
- timpani, 5 percussions ;
- 2 harps, accordion, synthesizer, celesta ;
- strings (12.12.8.8.6)
On December 21, 2019, the opera will be performed in Germany for the first time, at the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich, conducted by Cornelius Meister and directed by Andreas Kriegenburg.
On November 27, 2015, the Deutsches National Theater in Weimar presented the world première of an opera by Georg Alexander Albrecht based on the same fairy tale.
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