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New Recording of Agata Zubel and Maja Kleczewska's Oresteia Released on ANAKLASIS

May. 29, 2023

PWM's ANAKLASIS label has just released a new recording of Agata Zubel and Maja Kleczewska'sOresteia, based on the tragedy by Aeschylus. The opera's tale of bloody crime, family tragedy, and the force of destiny through the words of the ancient playwright continues to move audiences and artists to this day.

Written in 2011 as a commission from the Teatr Wielki – Polish National Opera, the "dramopera" Oresteia, directed by librettist Maja Kleczewska, was premiered in that theater in 2012. Notably, though there were no women performers in ancient dramas, the authors entrusted the parts of both Clytemnestra and Orestes to the excellent Polish actress Danuta Stenka, thus proposing a new way of interpreting that work.

"Concerns about the purity of the [operatic] genre are, I believe, unnecessary," said Agata Zubel in an interview. And indeed, she is not concerned. Oresteia for soloists, actors, choir, percussion, and electronics boldly features various aesthetics and types of sound. Zubel, herself an outstanding singer and composer, attaches great importance to the human voice as the most unique of all instruments. Each human voice is one of a kind, after all. 

Interestingly, in Zubel and Kleczewska's Oresteia, actress Danuta Stenka personified two opposites, playing both the killer and the avenger. In this tale about the nature of evil and the vicissitudes of justice, her artistic collaborators included Anna Zawisza (soprano), Michał Sławecki (countertenor), Tomasz Piluchowski (tenor), and The Polish Radio Choir, as well as percussionists: Krzysztof Niezgoda, Leszek Lorent, and Tamara Kurkiewicz. Szymon Wyrzykowski conducted the dramatic scenic work.


Agata Zubel and Maja Kleczewska/Oresteia: Akt I - Klitajmestra III/Szymon Wyrzykowski, conductor

Oresteia is PWM's latest release in ANAKLASIS'S OPERA series, which presents outstanding compositions for voices and instruments, ones that go beyond the tradition-sanctified understanding of the term ‘opera’. 

Click here to purchase Oresteia.

To learn more about Agata Zubel, visit: pwm.com.pl

Agata Zubel
Oresteia (2011)
libretto by Maja Kleczewska
based on the tale by Aeschylus

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