Turning points are carefully signaled: For example, when Leona realizes-or thinks she realizes-that her husband hates her, the pounding orchestration disappears to leave her voice nakedly and poignantly exposed.įour skilled young singers each sang two roles-a participant and a witness-with only slight changes of hair and costume. Like the instruments, the voices are amplified and sometimes electronically manipulated and distorted, alerting the listener to the fact that a character may be lying, or remembering wrong. Vocal lines are direct and unembellished, often with repeated notes and a sudden drop into a lower register for just a syllable or two. Cerrone’s score, for nine instrumentalists and electronics, opens with a wind-like wash of sound the instrumental soundscape, with fragments of melody subtly woven into a foundation of percussion, remains alluringly and dramatically hypnotic. Finally, the revelation that Ambrose has a weak heart as a result of rheumatic fever in childhood-the frailty in the relationship is his, not hers-becomes central to the unraveling of the mystery. Leona saves herself from being raped she tries to rescue her husband and intervenes in the fight between the men. In a modern feminist twist, the opera’s woman is given more agency. In the Japanese original, the woman having been raped is the core of the story, making honor-that of the woman and that of her samurai husband-a critical factor. Each of the three participants claims responsibility for Ambrose’s death. Seven testimonies-four from witnesses with fragmentary knowledge, three from the participants themselves-offer conflicting interpretations of what happened. He lures Ambrose into a grove with the promise of a hidden treasure, ties him up, and then goes back to rape Leona. The Outlaw, Luther Harlow, sees The Settler, Ambrose Raines, and his wife, Leona Raines, riding through a mountain landscape left desolate by a wildfire.

The setting has been updated from ancient Japan to Oregon in 1921 other significant details have been changed as well. Madeline Ehlinger and Andrew Turner in Pittsburgh Opera’s ‘In a Grove’PHOTO: DAVID BACHMAN However, its libretto insists on resolving the mystery, which the story does not. Based on the Ryūnosuke Akutagawa story that inspired Akira Kurosawa’s renowned 1950 film “Rashomon,” the 60-minute opera’s moody, haunting score, laced with electronics, explores the uncertainties-multiple, conflicting testimonies-that are the hallmarks of the story and the film. ‘In a Grove”by composer Christopher Cerrone and librettist Stephanie Fleischmann, which had its world premiere at the Pittsburgh Opera’s Bitz Opera Factory on Saturday, is all about atmosphere. Composer Christopher Cerrone and librettist Stephanie Fleischmann offer an updated, Americanized take on the Japanese director’s ‘Rashomon.’

In a Grove by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa