FREE WILL
World première
An opera in two acts composed by an open, international online community called Opera by You.
The project is coordinated by a team of operatives consisting of:
Composition: Markus Fagerudd
Libretto: Iida Hämeen-Anttila
Stage direction: Jere Erkkilä
Stage and lighting design: Samuli Laine
Costumes: Essi Palo
Production: Jukka Pohjolainen
Make-up and hair: Jani Kylmälä (online community),
Kaisa Kinnunen & Katja Paakki
Conductor:Sasha Mäkilä
First performance in Savonlinna, Savonlinna Opera Festival, Olavinlinna, 21 July 2012.
Free Will is about a fight between good and evil in the year 2012. God has had enough of all the misery and suffering in the world and has called a meeting of angels. They decide to send past geniuses back to the land of the living to make life better. Their purpose is to revolutionise art and science, and to establish peace on earth. The geniuses are Joan of Arc, Oscar Wilde and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. To assist them they have angels. Their opponents are a female Lucifer and giants.
The community has designed for the Olavinlinna Castle stage a visual world of 2012 reflecting political unrest, ongoing crises and the age-old fight between good and evil. Among the characters are a devil dressed as a woman, a world-famous Mozart look-alike pop musician and the Opera Festival chorus, sometimes speaking for the devil and at other times for God. Effects seldom seen in Olavinlinna Castle will be used in the visualisation.