The Blind at Theater an der Wien

The Theater an der Wien in 2011, the world premiere of Lera Auerbach's Gogol presents - a grand opera with chorus, soloists numerous and enormous orchestral forces. In the chamber opera, we now show the filigree nucleus of Auerbach's work in the genre of opera. The writer, pianist and composer Auerbach used a haunting text by Maurice Maeterlinck, Les Aveugles (1890) as a template and use it with haunting: The Blind was established in 2001 as an A cappella opera for twelve singers. No orchestra, no instrument embeds the votes, there are only these twelve people, alone in the dark.

On a lonely forest clearing a group waiting man in the return of the priest who had led them there to get them to enjoy the last rays of sun before winter. The longer the wait time drags on, the more restless are the blind: In their helplessness they are unable to move from the spot. Your anxiety builds to bare horror as they discover the corpse of the priest. The blind form a circle around the dead and begin to pray for forgiveness and salvation. During the prayer steps are heard. In his mother's arms, the small child, the only person in the group with healthy eyesight, in anguished cry breaks out. What the child sees? Is it close so desperately hoped for salvation, or is it death?