Exils 2 - Montpellier Opera house (2026) - Exils 2 - Opéra-Orchestre National de Montpellier (2026)

Description

Following the first opus, which we reviewed last season in our French columns, the Montpellier Opera continues its "Exils" cycle.

"Let us continue to explore the fate of composers marked by exile, forced to reinvent their art far from their native land.

Among them, parallel trajectories echo each other with poignant force. Korngold and Schoenberg, two major figures of Viennese music, had to flee Nazism. The former found refuge in Hollywood where he revolutionized film music; the latter reconstructed his musical language in the United States. Their works bear the scars of this uprooting, between nostalgia and audacity. Pablo Casals and Roberto Gerhard, Spanish exiles, embody resistance through music. Casals, an opponent of Franco, transformed El cant dels ocells into an anthem of freedom. Gerhard, a disciple of Schoenberg, blended avant-garde and Catalan folklore in a unique style, shaped by his exile in England. Arvo Pärt, Olga Podgaiskaya, and Samir Odeh-Tamimi extend this reflection on wandering and creation. Pärt, forced to leave Soviet Estonia, found refuge in timeless music. Podgaiskaya and Odeh-Tamimi, heirs to these journeys, in turn question borders and shifting identities. An evening resonating with the echoes of a torn 20th century and the persistence of a beauty born of absence. A world concert where each note echoes a lost land, but also the hope of a new beginning.

Program :

Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897 – 1957)
Theme and variations, opus 42
Passover Psalm opus 30

Pablo Casals (1876 – 1973)
El cant dels ocells (The song of the birds)

Arvo Pärt (born 1935)
In Principio

Olga Podgaiskaya (born 1981)
Captain of the planets

Arnold Schoenberg (1874 – 1951)
Friede auf Erden opus 13

Roberto Gerhard (1896 – 1970)
Dances from Don Quixote

Samir Odeh – Tamimi (born 1970 )
Aufbruch

More information is available on the official website of the opera house.