Prometeo

Prometeo (Prometheus) is a 150-minute opera by Luigi Nono, written between 1981 and 1984 and revised in 1985. Here the word "opera" carries the generic Italian meaning of "work," as in work of art, and not its usual meaning. Indeed, Nono scornfully labels Prometeo a "tragedia dell'ascolto", a tragedy of listening. Objectively it can be considered a sequence of nine cantatas, the longest lasting 23 minutes. The Italian libretto, by Massimo Cacciari, selects from texts by such varied authors as Aeschylus, Walter Benjamin and Rainer Maria Rilke and presents the different versions of the myth of Prometheus without telling any version literally.

Prometeo in its final form (1985) is scored for

The work's nine sections are:

At the premiere of the first version, at the Church of San Lorenzo in Venice on September 25, 1984, Claudio Abbado was the conductor, with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, a choir from the Freiburg Conservatorium, and the following vocal soloists: Ingrid Ade, Monika Bair-Ivenz, Bernadette Manca di Nissa, Susanne Otto, and Mario Bolognesi. It is not clear whether a Conductor II was deployed. The revised and final Prometeo premiered at Teatro alla Scala in Milan on September 25, 1985. Nono banned all photography of the production in an attempt to stop what he called "artistic consumerism."

Prometeo was presented as part of the Berliner Festspiele in September 2011 under Matilda Hofman (Conductor II) and Arturo Tamayo (Conductor I); Cyndia Sieden, Silke Evers, Susanne Otto, Noa Frenkel, and Hubert Mayer were the vocal soloists, with the Konzerthausorchester Berlin. Its American premiere took place at Argentina's Teatro Colón, in November 2013.

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