HERESY reviewed in German Magazine HiFi & RECORDS
Hans-Dieter Grünefeld of HiFi & Records magazine has reviewed Rogers Doyle’s HERESY.
TRANSLATION:
“A fortuitous meeting in Dublin between Director/Producer Eric Fraad, and Irish composer Roger Doyle generated an idea for an opera that would fit into Fraad’s vision for his record label, Heresy Records. The subject agreed upon was a work based on the life, death and works of the Italian philosopher Giordano Bruno. Bruno was regarded as a notorious heretic by the Inquisition and burned at the stake. As of this date, the church has not relinquished its position.
Fascinated by James Joyce’s novel “Finnegan’s Wake,” particularly the correlation with Bruno’s theory of the coincidence of opposites – a theme which repeats itself throughout Joyce’s masterpiece – prompted the noted electronic music specialist Doyle to create a scenario on two sonic aesthetic levels: while the computer-generated music gives Bruno’s life a solemn aura, punctuating critical situations with threatening sounds; the contrasting bright high tessitura performed by the male and female singers generates a striking relationship with the electronic orchestration. In the vocal sense, “Heresy” depicts the real and idealized worlds using dialogue-like recitatives or melodic arias in scenes of conflict with earth and heaven. (The verdict is issued only at the trial). The psychedelic overture to Act I, a vivace dance to Act 2, and rock grooves structure the plot, whereby Bruno’s incarceration in the Cell-Hallucinations scene, composed in multi-stylistic musical genres, both references and introduces Doyle’s spiritual heir, James Joyce. A gripping operatic kaleidoscope.”
The HERESY double CD with 24 page booklet is available to buy from the Heresy Records store – BUY NOW