Tolvskillingsopera (Threepenny Opera)

9 September 2019

Today's show is courtesy of Kompis Sverige - The Threepenny Opera at Folk Opera Theatre, an opera originated from Germany that made its debut on 31 August 1928. This is the Swedish version. A fantastic music play with a couple of burlesque dances too. 

Here is an overview of the play from Wikipedia.

Set in Victorian London, the play focuses on Macheath, an amoral, antiheroic criminal. Macheath ("Mackie," or "Mack the Knife") marries Polly Peachum. This displeases her father, who controls the beggars of London, and he endeavours to have Macheath hanged. His attempts are hindered by the fact that the Chief of Police, Tiger Brown, is Macheath's old army comrade. Still, Peachum exerts his influence and eventually gets Macheath arrested and sentenced to hang. Macheath escapes this fate via a deus ex machina moments before the execution when, in an unrestrained parody of a happy ending, a messenger from the Queen arrives to pardon Macheath and grant him the title of Baron. The details of the original 1928 text have often been substantially modified in later productions.

Opera - Skapelsen (The Creation)

5 April 2019

Volunteer activity with Kompis Sverige at an opera play titled Skapelsen (The Creation) - how earth was created in 7 days, love stories narration of 4 couples and the play ended with a real wedding solemnisation and an after party. Different couples will be wedded at every performance slot. I wondered if it is a free wedding, though. There is a live orchestra for you and you have a willing audience to witness your wedding. Why not, right?

The first day in the play reminded me of Tarabas from The Cave of the Golden Rose where everyone is clad in dark clothes and in a dark place.

I like this 1.5 hour play as it has English subtitles for the opera at separate screens (my Swedish is not at a level that I can understand Biblical words). I wondered if this is done for every opera play in this theatre. This is my first time experiencing this in all my theatre's visits. 

This is the story 4 couples - the first was a Palestinian man who was separated from his Syrian girlfriend due to the war and reunited in Sweden after 5 years. 

Kung Roger Opera

2 April 2019

Today, I watched an opera for the first time at the Royal Opera, titled Kung Roger (King Roger), thanks to Kulturkompis. I went with 2 friends from the group (where we meet 4 times in a span of 6 months). Depending on tickets availability, we get to enjoy these cultural events without a fee. I have met up with this group twice. This is our third outing together. The first time - Millesgarden and the second time - Hallwy Museum.

This is my first time in the hall and it is beautiful! It looked so grand.  

I expected an old school opera performance but instead I got a modern scene with the king in a suit, fantastic technical props, Matrix-like scenes, Swedish subtitles (opera was in Polish) above the stage which was a bit inconvenient because I have to shift my gaze to the top to read the subtitles to the scene to watch the play and a huge screen above the stage that showed a snake trying to kill the king (in the beginning). Sometimes, I got tired doing that and decided to focus on the play. No photos and videos allowed during the show, so I only took a picture after the opera ended. There was an orchestra below the stage that accompanied the entire opera.