A spokesperson says---
“...The Dialogue of Memories, a new opera by composer Tom Cipullo and acclaimed Chicago Tribune journalist Howard Reich, on a three-city U.S. tour this May. The work marks the first time Nobel Peace Prize laureate Elie Wiesel is portrayed as a character in an opera, drawing on Reich’s real-life friendship with Wiesel and his investigation into his mother’s long-hidden past…
...The opera opens with Reich’s line, “I suffer from an event I have not even experienced.” When his mother Sonia’s trauma from the Holocaust resurfaces late in life, Reich is drawn into a history his family had long avoided.
As he begins to uncover his mother’s past, Reich forms an unexpected bond with Wiesel, who appears throughout the opera as a guiding presence. As in life, Wiesel challenges Reich to ask questions, tell his mother’s story, and reckon with what he has inherited – and what he chooses to do with it.
In the final moments of the work, Wiesel’s message is direct: “We are ordered to hope.”..."
CAST:
Elie Wiesel: Daniel Belcher (Baritone)
Sonia Reich: Megan Marino (Mezzo-soprano)
Howard Reich: Dominic Armstrong (Tenor)
CREATIVE TEAM:
Composer: Tom Cipullo
Librettist: Howard Reich (with Tom Cipullo)
Conductor: Alastair Willis
Stage Director: Erich Parce
Media Designer: Peter Crompton
