Commission to Gordon Kampe

Odyssey – A Journey Through the Children’s Room is an opera for children composed by Gordon Kampe for the Vienna State Opera. Using a framing narrative (the “journey through the children’s room”), Homer’s epic is retold. Back to the origins, back to antiquity, back to childhood.

A father enters a chaotic children’s room. Tidying up becomes an odyssey; his encounters with the toys not only stir memories, but also draw him into ancient history and the world of Greek mythology: Odysseus must leave his homeland of Ithaca—and above all, his family and fiancée Penelope—to help Menelaus find the abducted Helen. Odysseus’s companions fall overboard one by one; he encounters the man-eating Laestrygonians, makes stops on the slopes of Mount Lot, on Aiaiai, and in Hades; he navigates the strait between Scylla and Charybdis; he meets the one-eyed Cyclops Polyphemus, the wind god Aeolus, the six-headed sea monster Scylla, as well as the alluring Sirens, the enchantress Circe, and he spends seven years with the nymph Calypso.

The (young) audience is taken on an adventure: Gordon Kampe and librettist Catharina von Bülow weave an imaginative bridge from the present to myth—and back again. Intuitively, through rich sounds and imagery, they tell the story of Odysseus, blurring the lines between reality and fantasy and thus opening up a space for children’s imaginations.

Gordon Kampe’s commission for the Vienna State Opera is made possible by the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation.

Further information:
wiener-staatsoper.at

Dates

October 1, 3, 5, 7, 10, 2027
NEST, Vienna

Additional dates to follow.