The time is Azuchi Momoyama Era, Japan. Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the conqueror of the kingdoms falls for food poisoning. When his wife and queen Nĕnĕ is also about to fall from stress and fatigue trying to run the thrown room during his absence, dream and reality start to merge into a strange potpourri of opera…
This work was an attempt in combining opera and pop comedy in an ancient Japanese setting. The work was designed in both languages at the same time, and the actual performance had no subtitles. The English speaking character was not understood to the Japanese character as well as the Japanese audience, but the Japanese character plays on this fact, as usually a casual viewer(or listener) of an opera will not know what they are saying. The work was preceded by a lecture about sleep deprivation(as it being at a university) by Seiji Nishino, and thus the theme of the opera was set to match this.
Premiered October 21, 2017 Tokyo University, Japan
CAST and STAFF
Nĕnĕ – (Soprano)
Kăgĕmushă – (Tenor)
Shakuhachi / Narration
Kuloko – (Baritone)
Shota Mondo – Guitar
Yuta Aikawa – Percussion
Tai Hasegawa – Producer
Seiji Nishino – Lecture
Sakagch Akeala, Benjamin Belew
– story, script, music, visual design, piano, director
Article(Japanese)by 世界睡眠会議