November will be a month of touring for the works produced by “Operomanija”, with a route extending through Strasbourg (France), Huddersfield (UK) and ending in Šiauliai. November will also bring the sound recording sessions of the musical performance Sports Group for the upcoming vinyl album; rehearsals of the “Sodo 2123” choir, formed in October, will continue as well.
November repertoire:
10 and 11 November – Radvila Darius, Son of Vytautas; Maillon, Grande Salle (Strasbourg, France).
20 November – Navigations (from Bad Weather series); Huddersfield Town Hall (Huddersfield, United Kingdom).
29 November – Sports Group; Šiauliai State Drama Theatre, Virus Festival.
On 1, 2 and 3 December the winter will begin with a premiere that has been in the making for two and a half years – the payphone opera Things I Didn’t Dare To Say, And It’s Too Late Now (director and playwright Kamilė Gudmonaitė, composer Dominykas Digimas, set designer and author of the concept of video projections Barbora Šulniūtė; a co-production between “Operomanija”, the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre and the Lithuanian National Drama Theatre).
The work was inspired by a story that happened in Japan where after losing his beloved cousin a man set up a phone booth so that he could “call” him to express his thoughts while mourning, and the words would be “scattered away by the wind”. Following the 2011 tsunami, this booth became a symbolic place to call the lost loved ones. The opera is based on people’s thoughts for their loved ones, expressed in a payphone booth that had been installed at the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre since 1 March 2022, just one week after Russia began the war in Ukraine. People were invited to drop in and “call” the ones they had not been able or did not dare to express their feelings or thoughts. Audio recordings of these authentic stories became the basis for the libretto of the opera Things I Didn’t Dare To Say, And It’s Too Late Now.