Noises, Sounds & Sweet Airs
Encyclopedia
Noises, Sounds & Sweet Airs is a 1991
opera
by Michael Nyman
that began as an opera-ballet
titled La Princesse de Milan choreographed by Karine Saporta
. The libretto is William Shakespeare
's The Tempest
, as abridged by the composer. The title is derived from Caliban
's line, "This isle is full of noises, sounds, and sweet airs, which give delight and hurt not." It premiered in June 1991 in Hérouville-Saint-Clair
, Calvados
, France, with the Ensemble Instrumental de Basse-Normandie conducted by Dominique Debart. Three members of Saporta's dance company provided the singing.
The opera is scored for one soprano
, one contralto
, and one tenor
, two saxophone
s, and orchestra
. The three singers are not assigned roles on character lines. They are voices, "carriers of text", and two or three singers often sing the role of a single character at points in the opera, and no character is sung consistently by any one voice. As originally performed, the dancers portrayed the characters. Nyman's liner notes of the recording give no indication of how the opera could be staged dramatically without the dancers, even though which title is used is dependent upon whether dancers are utilized. The opera-only version, which premiered in 1993, also includes more of Shakespeare's text.
Nyman and Saporta collaborated on Prospero's Books
, Peter Greenaway
's film version of The Tempest, and were interested in working further with the play. Nyman did not base his score on that he wrote for Prospero's Books, but began a new score from scratch, occasionally interpolating music from the previous score as is his wont. He chose not to set Ariel's songs or the Masque, which he had already set, but he allows for them to be interpolated into the opera. Some of the music, such as in "The fringed curtains of thine eye advance" and "Ye elves" are known to be derived from La Traversée de Paris
. The instrumental piece that became "Ye elves" is retitled "Miranda
Previsted" on The Very Best of Michael Nyman: Film Music 1980-2001
.
Nyman allows for "The Masque", written for Prospero's Books, to be inserted between Sections 12 and 13.
on May 16, 1995. It has a running time of 72:35. It is again performed by the Ensemble de Basse-Normandie conducted by Dominque Debart. The saxophones are played by David Roach and Andrew Findon
. It is the fourth release of Nyman's music that Nyman himself supervised, on which he provides liner notes
and produced, but neither performs nor conducts. The album is the first of Nyman's many collaborations with Hilary Summers
.
Recorded in Caen
, June 1991, and Abbey Road Studios
, London, June 1993.
Mixed at Kitsch Studio, Brussels
Edited at Transfermation and Abbey Road Studios, London
1991 in music
See also:* 1991 in music Record labels established in 1991-Summary:The year 1991 is the year that grunge music made its popular breakthrough. Nirvana's Nevermind, led by the surprise hit single "Smells Like Teen Spirit", becomes the most popular U.S. album of the year...
opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
by Michael Nyman
Michael Nyman
Michael Laurence Nyman, CBE is an English composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano...
that began as an opera-ballet
Opéra-ballet
Opéra-ballet was a popular genre of French Baroque opera, "that grew out of the ballets à entrées of the early seventeeth century". It differed from the more elevated tragédie en musique as practised by Jean-Baptiste Lully in several ways...
titled La Princesse de Milan choreographed by Karine Saporta
Karine Saporta
Karine Saporta is a French choreographer, dancer, photographer, and short film director. She is one of the most prominent figures in French dance....
. The libretto is William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
's The Tempest
The Tempest
The Tempest is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1610–11, and thought by many critics to be the last play that Shakespeare wrote alone. It is set on a remote island, where Prospero, the exiled Duke of Milan, plots to restore his daughter Miranda to her rightful place,...
, as abridged by the composer. The title is derived from Caliban
Caliban (character)
Caliban is one of the primary antagonists in William Shakespeare's play The Tempest.- Character :Caliban is forced into servitude on an island ruled by Prospero. While he is referred to as a calvaluna or mooncalf, a freckled monster, he is the only human inhabitant of the island that is otherwise...
's line, "This isle is full of noises, sounds, and sweet airs, which give delight and hurt not." It premiered in June 1991 in Hérouville-Saint-Clair
Hérouville-Saint-Clair
Hérouville-Saint-Clair is a commune in the Calvados department in the Basse-Normandie region in northwestern France.It is a suburb of the city of Caen, and lies adjacent to it in a northeasterly direction, along the west side of the Canal de Caen à la Mer...
, Calvados
Calvados
The French department of Calvados is part of the region of Basse-Normandie in Normandy. It takes its name from a cluster of rocks off the English Channel coast...
, France, with the Ensemble Instrumental de Basse-Normandie conducted by Dominique Debart. Three members of Saporta's dance company provided the singing.
The opera is scored for one soprano
Soprano
A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...
, one contralto
Contralto
Contralto is the deepest female classical singing voice, with the lowest tessitura, falling between tenor and mezzo-soprano. It typically ranges between the F below middle C to the second G above middle C , although at the extremes some voices can reach the E below middle C or the second B above...
, and one tenor
Tenor
The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...
, two saxophone
Saxophone
The saxophone is a conical-bore transposing musical instrument that is a member of the woodwind family. Saxophones are usually made of brass and played with a single-reed mouthpiece similar to that of the clarinet. The saxophone was invented by the Belgian instrument maker Adolphe Sax in 1846...
s, and orchestra
Orchestra
An orchestra is a sizable instrumental ensemble that contains sections of string, brass, woodwind, and percussion instruments. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ορχήστρα, the name for the area in front of an ancient Greek stage reserved for the Greek chorus...
. The three singers are not assigned roles on character lines. They are voices, "carriers of text", and two or three singers often sing the role of a single character at points in the opera, and no character is sung consistently by any one voice. As originally performed, the dancers portrayed the characters. Nyman's liner notes of the recording give no indication of how the opera could be staged dramatically without the dancers, even though which title is used is dependent upon whether dancers are utilized. The opera-only version, which premiered in 1993, also includes more of Shakespeare's text.
Nyman and Saporta collaborated on Prospero's Books
Prospero's Books
Prospero's Books , written and directed by Peter Greenaway, is a cinematic adaptation of The Tempest, by William Shakespeare. John Gielgud is Prospero, the protagonist who provides the off-screen narration and the voices to the other story characters...
, Peter Greenaway
Peter Greenaway
Peter Greenaway, CBE is a British film director. His films are noted for the distinct influence of Renaissance and Baroque painting, and Flemish painting in particular...
's film version of The Tempest, and were interested in working further with the play. Nyman did not base his score on that he wrote for Prospero's Books, but began a new score from scratch, occasionally interpolating music from the previous score as is his wont. He chose not to set Ariel's songs or the Masque, which he had already set, but he allows for them to be interpolated into the opera. Some of the music, such as in "The fringed curtains of thine eye advance" and "Ye elves" are known to be derived from La Traversée de Paris
La Traversée de Paris (album)
La Traversée de Paris is an album by the Michael Nyman Band featuring music composed by Michael Nyman for an audio-visual exhibition of the same name which took place at the Grande Arche de la Défense from July to December 1989 to celebrate the bicentennial of the French Revolution.-Track...
. The instrumental piece that became "Ye elves" is retitled "Miranda
Miranda (Shakespeare)
In Shakespeare's play The Tempest, Miranda is the beautiful daughter of the old Duke Prospero.Cast away with her father since she was three years old, she has lived an extremely sheltered existence. Though she has received a well-rounded education from her father, she is desperately lacking in real...
Previsted" on The Very Best of Michael Nyman: Film Music 1980-2001
The Very Best of Michael Nyman: Film Music 1980-2001
The Very Best of Michael Nyman: Film Music 1980-2001 is a compilation album of film music by Michael Nyman, including three previously unreleased tracks and one from the limited release, La Traversée de Paris...
.
Libretto
The libretto, an abridgement of Shakespeare's play (with some slight wording changes) is divided into seventeen sections:- If by your Art, my dearest father (Act I, Scene 2)
- Alas, poor Milan! (Act I, Scene 2)
- Be't to fly (Act I, Scene 2)
- This damned witch SycoraxSycorax (Shakespeare)Sycorax , an unseen character in William Shakespeare's play The Tempest , is a powerful witch and the mother of Caliban, one of the few native inhabitants of the island on which Prospero, the hero of the play, is stranded....
(Act I, Scene 2) - The fringed curtains of thine eye advance (Act I, Scene 2)
- There's nothing ill can dwell in such a temple (Act I, Scene 2)
- How lush and lusty the grass looks! (Act II, Scene 1)
- Riches, poverty, and use of service, none (Act II, Scene 1)
- Sometime like apes/The master, the gunner, the boatswain, and I (Act II, Scene 2)
- Full many a lady I have eyed with best regard (Act III, Scene 1)
- 'Tis a custom in the afternoon to sleep (Act III, Scenes 2 and 3)
- I have made you mad (Act III, Scene 3, Act IV, Scene 1)
- You do look, my son, in a moved sort (Act IV, Scene 1, Act V, Scene 1)
- Ye elves (Act V, Scene 1)
- Thy brother was a furtherer in the act. (Act V, Scene 1)
- Sir, she is mortal (Act V, Scene 1)
- My tricksy spirit! (Act V, Scene 1)
Nyman allows for "The Masque", written for Prospero's Books, to be inserted between Sections 12 and 13.
Album
The album, Nyman's 25th release, was released by Argo RecordsArgo Records
Argo Records was started in December of 1955 to accommodate some of the rapidly growing recording activity at Chess Records. Originally the label was called Marterry, but bandleader Ralph Marterie objected, and within a couple of months the imprint was renamed Argo.Initially, Argo offered a...
on May 16, 1995. It has a running time of 72:35. It is again performed by the Ensemble de Basse-Normandie conducted by Dominque Debart. The saxophones are played by David Roach and Andrew Findon
Andrew Findon
Andrew Findon is an English flautist and saxophonist. Educated at Harrow County School for Boys, he trained as an orchestral flautist, and served as principal flute of the National Youth Orchestra in the early 1970s and three years at the Royal College of Music...
. It is the fourth release of Nyman's music that Nyman himself supervised, on which he provides liner notes
Liner notes
Liner notes are the writings found in booklets which come inserted into the compact disc jewel case or the equivalent packaging for vinyl records and cassettes.-Origin:...
and produced, but neither performs nor conducts. The album is the first of Nyman's many collaborations with Hilary Summers
Hilary Summers
Hilary Summers is a Welsh contralto. She was trained at Reading University, the Royal Academy of Music, and the National Opera Studio in London. She has performed on soundtracks such as The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, The Libertine, and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy...
.
Cast
- Catherine BottCatherine BottCatherine Bott is a British soprano and a baroque specialist.Following her studies at The King's High School For Girls, and Guildhall School of Music and Drama, with Arthur Reckless, she began her career as a member of the English baroque-jazz crossover group, The Swingle Singers...
, soprano - Hilary SummersHilary SummersHilary Summers is a Welsh contralto. She was trained at Reading University, the Royal Academy of Music, and the National Opera Studio in London. She has performed on soundtracks such as The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, The Libertine, and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy...
, contralto - Ian BostridgeIan BostridgeIan Bostridge CBE is an English tenor, well known for his performances as an opera singer and as a song recitalist.-Early life and education:...
, tenor
- David Roach, saxophone
- Andrew FindonAndrew FindonAndrew Findon is an English flautist and saxophonist. Educated at Harrow County School for Boys, he trained as an orchestral flautist, and served as principal flute of the National Youth Orchestra in the early 1970s and three years at the Royal College of Music...
, saxophone - Dominique Debart, conductorConductingConducting is the art of directing a musical performance by way of visible gestures. The primary duties of the conductor are to unify performers, set the tempo, execute clear preparations and beats, and to listen critically and shape the sound of the ensemble...
Crew
- Instrumental recording produced by David Cunningham & Michael NymanMichael NymanMichael Laurence Nyman, CBE is an English composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano...
- Vocal recording produced by Andrew Cornall & Michael Nyman
- Mixed by Michael J. Dutton & Michael Nyman
- Executive producer: Michael J. Dutton
- Engineer: Michael J. Dutton
- Assistant engineers: Chris Brown & Denis Wauthy
- Artist representative for Michael Nyman: Nigel BarrNigel BarrNigel Barr grew up as a member of the High Wycombe Salvation Army band. In 1980 he went to the Guildhall School of Music and studied trombone with Peter Gane and Denis Wick during that time he was also a member of International Staff Band playing bass trombone.Since then Nigel has had a varied...
- Art direction: David SmartDavid SmartDave Smart is a Canadian basketball coach. He has served as the head men's basketball coach at Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario since 1999, leading the Ravens to seven Canadian Interuniversity Sport national championships...
- Design: Jeremy Tilston
Recorded in Caen
Caen
Caen is a commune in northwestern France. It is the prefecture of the Calvados department and the capital of the Basse-Normandie region. It is located inland from the English Channel....
, June 1991, and Abbey Road Studios
Abbey Road Studios
Abbey Road Studios is a recording studio located at 3 Abbey Road, St John's Wood, City of Westminster, London, England. It was established in November 1931 by the Gramophone Company, a predecessor of British music company EMI, its present owner...
, London, June 1993.
Mixed at Kitsch Studio, Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
Edited at Transfermation and Abbey Road Studios, London
Track listing
The track listing differs slightly from the sections of the opera. Up through section 12, the tracks conform to the sections. Section 13, however, is spread over three tracks, "You do look, my son, in a moved sort", "At last I left them", and "At this hour lie at my mercy." Section 15 does not start at the beginning of a new track, but is appended at the end of track 16/Section 14, "Ye elves", and begins a new track with "Behold, sir King." Finally, section 17, is divided into two tracks, "My tricksy spirit!" and "Coragio, bully-monster", for a total of twenty tracks from the seventeen sections.- If by your Art, my dearest father 4:02
- Alas, poor Milan! 3:51
- Be't to fly 3:40
- This damned witch Sycorax 4:37
- The fringed curtains of thine eye 4:35
- There's nothing ill can dwell 2:46
- How lush and lusty the grass 3:12
- Riches, poverty, and use of service 2:21
- Sometime like apes 2:49
- Full many a lady I have eyed 4:35
- 'Tis a custom in the afternoon to sleep 5:37
- I have made you mad 4:15
- You do look, my son, in a moved sort 3:40
- At last I left them 1:30
- At this hour lie at my mercy 1:48
- Ye elves 6:56
- Behold, sir King 2:05
- Sir, she is mortal 1:42
- My tricksy spirit! 3:03
- Coragio, bully-monster 5:51