This opera was commissioned by the Proms and co-funded by SOCAN Foundation to a young Kelowna composer Antony Knight. It is based on George Elliot’s horror novella “The Lifted Veil”. The plot is spooky and terrifically entertaining!

Tickets by donation

Edvard Munch - Anxiety (1894)

Rachel Park, soprano
Ian Cleary, tenor
Alireza Mojibian, baritone
Matthew Kim, baritone
Dana Hudson & Vince Walzak, spoken roles

Cvetozar Vutev, Music Director
Carol Colpitts, Piano

Stage direction - Antony Knight and Alex Allen

Tickets by donation.

Music by Antony Knight
Libretto by Alex Allen

Oh Alfred! (Opera in 2 Acts)

  Oh Alfred! follows a clairvoyant named Latimer, a resentful and frail young man who has spent many years of his life in boarding school. After years of estrangement, his family surprises him with news that his brother, Alfred, is engaged with a young woman named Bertha. However, the couple requests more than just his attendance — they’d like one of his visions as a wedding gift, one to confirm their eternal love in the eyes of the community.

 The dark and psychological plot, inspired by characters and moments from George Eliot’s “The Lifted Veil,” shows equal parts comedy and tragedy. The opera leans heavily into conventional tropes in order to create an over-dramatic and even farcical atmosphere, later twisted in a sinister turn of events. Librettist Alex Allen crafts this mood via an archaic pastiche of Victorian English, verging at times on ridiculousness, though never far from passion and eloquence.

 The music of Oh Alfred!, composed by Antony Knight, uses short, fast-changing musical sections spanning many genres and textures: jazz, folk, pop, musical theatre, and Irish traditional, just to name a few. Additionally, Knight employs various homages to operatic styles in order to amplify the farcical nature of the story. These various elements work to develop characters’ identities, identities that evolve and morph as textures and motifs become altered and exchanged.

commission
co-funded by