On 6 February Leith’s Last Days received its US premiere with the LA Philharmonic and GBSR Duo at Walt Disney Hall. The sold-out performance was conducted by Thomas Adès and directed by Anna Morrissey and Matt Copson. Costumes were designed by Parisian couturier Balenciaga, which previously received coverage in Vogue. Both opera and production debuted at the Royal Opera House’s Linbury Theatre in autumn 2022 in a sellout run of critically-acclaimed performances. Its US debut was previewed in Rolling Stone and the New York Times.
The 90-minute chamber opera, with a text by Matt Copson, is based on Gus Van Sant’s 2005 film about a rockstar’s flight from rehab. In a self-destructive spiral he encounters his agent, a Superfan, housemates, a pair of Mormons, private detective and groundskeeper, as well as an enigmatic (silent) magician.
Actor Agathe Rousselle played the non-singing lead role of Blake – a nearly-mute mumbling figure in a world where cereal bowls, glass bottles, and DHL delivery drivers have their own music. The score integrates recorded and found sounds, such as a recording of a Montana cattle auctioneer who voices Blake’s agent and a Sacred Harp hymn that intermingles with voices onstage and in the pit. The piece is another reflection of Leith’s fascination with the ordinary, noting in an interview that he wanted to write an opera “about somebody putting their bins out.”
A world premiere recording, featuring 12 Ensemble, GBSR Duo conducted by Jack Sheen, is forthcoming from Platoon in April 2024; listen to an excerpt here. A strings-only version of the Italian verismo-style aria written for indie pop sensation Caroline Polachek – called “heartbreakingly freighted with nostalgia and elegy” (The Times) – appears on 12 Ensemble’s Metamorphosis album, released 1 March – listen here.
The cast comprised James Hayden (Private Investigator), Mimi Doulton (Delivery Driver and Housemate), Edmund Danon (Housemate), Patricia Auchterlonie (Superfan), Isaiah Musik-Ayala (Groundskeeper), Arnold Livingston Geis (Mormon/Housemate) Kathryn Shuman (Mormon/Housemate) and Sam Dash as the Magician. The production was lit by Prema Mehta with sound design by Sound Intermedia. A star-studded after-party was showcased in Flaunt magazine.
On 6 April 2024 Thomas Adès returns to Leith’s music, conducting the Hallé orchestra in the world premiere of Cartoon Sun at Bridgewater Hall. The 14-minute work is inspired by bells in their varied forms, making use of pitched and unpitched varieties in numerous shapes and sizes – church bells (“like the lopsided regularity of English church bells at a celebration”), cowbells, tubular bells, and sleigh bells, all emerging from imperceptible quiet and ending in radiant sunshine. It was commissioned by Hallé Concerts Society for Thomas Adès in his first year as Artist in Residence with the Orchestra.