A group of teenagers commits a brutal murder. The victim is the lover of the mother of young Noboru, one of the boys. The motive: a perceived betrayal – by the sea, which the fisherman was prepared to give up for love. Japanese writer Yukio Mishima’s story was adapted by Hans Werner Henze in 1990 for the Deutsche Oper Berlin as a powerful work of music theatre. In 2006, a completely revised version in Japanese, under the novel’s original title »Gogo no Eiko«, received its second world premiere at the Salzburg Festival.
Father figures and fatherlessness, love, hatred and the unbridgeable divide between generations come together in a profound study of society, for which Henze found a compelling yet transparent musical language, often remarkably delicate. The orchestral forces are largely classically European in instrumentation, while the percussion section gains distinctive colours and sonorities from the Japanese double-headed drum O-Daiko and other special instruments. Against this backdrop, demanding vocal parts move between rhythmic speech-song and lyrical episodes: waves on the vast ocean.
Under the musical direction of Alejo Pérez, Tokyo Nikikai Opera gave the German-language version of »Gogo no Eiko« its first performance in Tokyo in November 2023. The highly successful production can now be experienced in concert at the Elbphilharmonie – just in time for the composer Henze’s anniversary year, which marks what would have been his 100th birthday in 2026.
PERFORMERS
MDR-Sinfonieorchester orchestra
Masako Hayashi soprano
Yoshiaki Shindo tenor
Takashi Tomokiyo baritone
Teruhiko Komori bass
Alejo Pérez conductor
PROGRAM
Hans Werner Henze (Text: Hans-Ulrich Treichel, Yukio Mishima)
The Betrayed Sea (Gogo no Eiko)
Concert performance in German
