Akhnaten – Philip Glass (original) (raw)

compositions

Akhnaten

An opera in three acts for orchestra, chorus and soloists

1983

180′

Music by Philip Glass. Libretto (Egyptian, Arcadian, Hebrew, and language of the audience) by the composer in association with Shalom Goldman, Robert Israel and Richard Riddell. Vocal text drawn from original sources by Shalom Goldman.

Cast

4S, 4Mz, Ct, T, Bar, B; STAB Chorus; (ballet in Act II); 2(pic).2(obda 1+2).2.bcl.2/4.3.3.1/ 3 perc (tom-t, SD, BD, cym, finger cyms, t.bells, wdbl)/ syn, cel (1 player)/ str (no violins)

Commission

Comissioned by the Württembergisch Staatstheater, Stuttgart

Premiere

March 24, 1984, Württembergisch Staatstheater Stuttgart conducted by Dennis Russell Davies

Notes

The third in the Glass’ trilogy of operas about men who changed the world in which they lived through the power of their ideas, “Akhnaten”‘s subject is religion. The Pharaoh Akhnaten was the first monotheist in recorded story, and his substitution of a one-god religion for the multi-god worship in use when he came to power was responsible for his violent overthrow. The opera describes the rise, reign, and fall of Akhnaten in a series of tableaus.

PUBLISHER:
Dunvagen Music Publishers