On Tuesday, April 8, 2014, Roulette presented the premiere of Gabrielle Herbst’s opera Bodiless in Brooklyn, New York. The piece was performed by Contemporaneous with David Bloom conducting with vocalists Lucy Dhegrae, Ariadne Greif, and Herbst herself. Initially conceived as a 10-minute opera short presented by Experiments in Opera in 2013, this performance featured a significantly expanded version that represents Herbst’s first evenling-length opera.
Gabrielle Herbst
Bodiless takes its inspiration from French feminist writer Hélène Cixous’ dream diaries Dream I Tell You. The libretto, written by Iceland-based Canadian writer Angela Rawlings, consists of three dream-like non-narrative tableaux that explore various themes including birth, life, and death.
The first act, TWI-, consists of a series of prefixes that gradually become fragments of sentences like “an airplane will save your life.” The second act, FORE, focuses on simple statements describing dreams, each phrase meant to embody an element of bodily loss. Phrases like “wind roars through the streets, whips newspaper past us” make up this section of the opera. The third and final act, -LESS, complements the first act, with the singers singing suffixes that eventually devolve into consonant sounds and breath.
Lucy Dhegrae
Between each act is a break of silence where the three vocalists move to the side of the stage in low-key lighting and adorn each other with various objects. The first break has the singers dress each other in feather vests, the second introduces wooden crowns, and a short break during the final act have the three singers wrap their bodies in a single sheet that joins them as one (the idea of embodiment in each other, which serves as the central theme in Bodiless.)
While Bodiless is classified as an opera, it was difficult to interpret it as such during the performance. The orchestra remained on stage with the singers, who stood still and sang into microphones, the only staging that progressed any kind of “plot” occurring during the breaks between acts. Rather than an opera, it may be more appropriate to classify Bodiless as a secular oratorio. In addition, the abstract nature of the libretto is self-described as “non-narrative,” which seems counterintuitive for the opera medium.
Despite the questionability of labeling the piece as an opera, Herbst’s vocal writing was particularly curious. Although there were three separate and distinct characters, the vocalists seemed grouped into one. Often, the singers’ vocal lines emerged from and grew into each other, creating a sense of one voice. This singular identity was emphasized through some minimal staging, such as when the vocalists covered their mouths when they weren’t singing during the line in Act II “I witnessed my own death.” According to Herbst, the three singers embody each other, which is clearly audible throughout the piece.
Ariadne Greif (photo credit: Aidan Schultz-Meyers)
The music itself was remarkably beautiful. The frequent use of canonic and melismatic vocal writing obscured the individual vocal lines, but lent them to an implied singular melodic line that was pleasing to listen to. This technique helped achieve the interconnectedness of the singer in the opera. In general, Herbst’s writing for the singers was excellent and allowed each of them to speak well while contributing to the larger implied melodic line.
While much of the music was lovely, there were some transitions that seemed awkward and jarring. Perhaps the few abrupt changes that struck out were purposeful, but it seemed like they may have been an issue with the orchestration where too much was lost too quickly. Though slightly distracting, the listener was quickly brought back into the expertly crafted sound world of the opera.
In spite of the few shortcomings of Bodiless, the piece is a lovely presentation of the female voice through the setting of abstract themes. Through the performance of Bodiless, Herbst proves to be both a glorious singer and a wonderful composer. Her unique voice is enticing, and her writing for the female voice is phenomenal.
