Amor Azul - opéra in 2 acts - Gilberto Gil & Aldo Brizzi
Origin: Brésil
The power and beauty of classical opera meets brazilian popular music.
About us
What happens when a great italian composer and one of the greatest names of brazilian music work together to tell a love story that travels through the centuries and continents ? Krishna meets Radha and opera meets brazilian popular music.
Amor azul is an opera about Love.
Love can be experienced and understood without sacred texts, because love lives within us. And by living withinus, love lives in the sacred texts. The words that tell the story of AMOR AZUL come from the Song of Songs, from Kalidasa's Cloud Messenger and from Jayadeva's Gita Govinda. With a few exceptions, the narrative structure of the opera is based on this last book.
The texts belong to the sacred sphere, but at the same time they are masterpieces of a universal literature, where eroticism becomes poetry. These works distinguish "the fierce love, the passion against reason, the blind strength of desire, insatiable as death", which will be relived in the story of AMOR AZUL.
In the opera, the action is divided into two levels: one (the opening) is the "cosmic" space of a mythical India, without time. The second, more physical level, represents a modern day incarnation of Krishna and Radha (the main singers) who are a young couple dealing with their emotions and re-living (in contemporary Brazil, or elsewhere) the same stories that infinitive lives have lived through before: the erotic jealousy, the separation and the nostalgia, the emotion of the return.
With a deep understanding of the intersections between classical, creative and world music, Aldo Brizzi always dreamed to unite classic with popular culture. Gilberto Gil embraced Aldo’s idea of composing together a breakthrough project rooted in opera but made with the most pure brazilian musical dna.
Aldo Brizzi et Gilberto Gil
‘Gilberto Gil and opera, a winning bet’ - Le Monde
Those who have toured the Maison ronde a thousand times can vouch for the fact that, for as long as they can remember, they have never seen the members of the Orchestre de Radio France and the Chœur de Radio France waddle so enthusiastically at the end of a performance.
This happened during the last of three concerts given at the Radio France auditorium in Paris on 2, 3 and 4 December 2022 by singer Gilberto Gil and composer and conductor Aldo Brizzi. The Brazilian and the Italian premiered Amor Azul, an opera they had co-written for seven years, between the drops of Covid-19 - a first for the co-founder of tropicalism and former Minister of Culture under President Lula.
Gallery
Press
A prodigious feast then - brass and woodwind were also part of the spectacle - you were left hoping that gil and brizzi will have a chance to bring another collaboration to town before too long. this is a hugely ambitious project that belongs to that noble brazilian mission of erasing the barriers between classical and popular music. THE TIMES
Listening to amor azul is like listening to the soul of the world, where there are no barriers, no boundaries, no separation among cultures, traditions, music and dance, where the words are sung in complete joy as an hymn to life. every aspect is connected to the rest of the opera, everything is interconnected and thrives in this environment, i like to think that this is how we could all live, if we allowed it. THE BADGER
"Gilberto Gil et l’opéra, pari gagné" - Le Monde Ceux qui ont fait mille fois le tour de la Maison ronde l’assurent : d’aussi loin qu’ils se souviennent, ils n’avaient jamais vu les membres de l’Orchestre et du Chœur de Radio France dodeliner avec autant d’entrain à l’issue d’un spectacle. Cet événement s’est produit lors du dernier des trois concerts donnés à l’auditorium de Radio France, à Paris, les 2, 3 et 4 décembre 2022, par le chanteur Gilberto Gil et le compositeur et chef d’orchestre Aldo Brizzi. Le Brésilien et l’Italien y créaient Amor Azul, un opéra qu’ils ont coécrit sept ans durant, entre les gouttes du Covid-19 ‒ une première pour le cofondateur du tropicalisme et ex-ministre de la culture du président Lula.