The Blind by Auerbach, Lera, Fra (2015/2015), Dirigent Erwin Ortner, Jordi Casals, Theater am Fleischmarkt, Vienna, Austria

In 2011, Theater an der Wien presented the world premiere of Lera Auerbach's Gogol - a great opera with a choir, numerous soloists and an enormous orchestra. In the chamber opera we are now showing the filigree nucleus of Auerbach's work in the opera genre. The writer, pianist and composer Auerbach used an oppressive text by Maurice Maeterlinck, Les Aveugles (1890), as a template and implements it vividly: The Blind was created in 2001 as an a cappella opera for twelve singers. No orchestra, no instrument embeds the voices, there are only these twelve people, alone in the darkness. (By wearing blindfolds, the audience experiences a special and extraordinary evening at the opera.) In a lonely clearing in the forest, a group of blind people are waiting for the return of the priest who had led them there to enjoy the last rays of sunshine before winter sets in. The longer the waiting time drags on, the more restless the blind become: in their helplessness they are unable to move from the spot. Their fear grows to naked horror when they discover the priest's corpse. The blind circle the dead and begin to pray for forgiveness and salvation. Steps become audible during prayer. In the arms of his mother, the small child, the only person in the group with healthy eyesight, bursts into fearful weeping. What does the child see? Is it the near, so desperately hoped for salvation, or is it death?