The World’s First Augenmusik Opera “Mascagni a Cerignola” Premieres

By Afton Markay

John Dante Prevedini and Raffaele Sorbo’s Augenmusik opera “Mascagni a Cerignola,” has made its world premiere.

Augenmusik, or eye music, is a form of notated music that is also visual art. The technique has been used by various influential composers since the Middle Ages, but has never been used to compose an opera until now. The new opera, “Mascagni a Cerignola” displays the face of Pietro Mascagni into a one-page score for a half-hour opera. The Italian libretto tells the true story of how Mascagni and his wife Lina changed opera history forever in 1889.

Jared Alexander Wise and Allison Messier made up the original cast. Prevedini accompanied them at the piano.

The composer told OperaWire, “I’ve come to theorize a distinction between two subtypes of Augenmusik that can be seen in its long history: ‘structural Augenmusik’ where the visible image conveys something about the music’s sonic structure, and ‘decorative Augenmusik’ where the visible image is independent of any implication for the music’s sonic structure. I depart from traditional musicology in that I see the potential of structural Augenmusik as a creative research tool for exploring effective musical narrative forms for new audiences today.”

He continued,  “It is my hope – given the scale, subject matter, and format of this project – that it might serve as an example of how structural Augenmusik can be used to make opera more accessible to a range of audiences in the social media era.”

 

 

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