Mischa Salkind -Pearl

Read Franny Zhang’s statement on our collaboration here:

For the 2021 concert season, composer Mischa Salkind-Pearl and librettist Franny Zhang will collaborate with avant-garde chamber opera company, Guerilla Opera, to create a 70-minute opera based on the short fiction of Anton Chekhov. Their adaptation will explore the eerie and not-often seen side of Chekhov, drawing on his mastery of mystery and psychological drama to bring his vision to a new medium and a new audience. A Dead Body is the second opera Guerilla Opera has commissioned from Salkind-Pearl, after 2015’s Troubled Water, and is writer Zhang’s first foray into opera.

The opera is currently titled A Dead Body and combines elements of Chekhov’s “A Dead Body”, “A Bad Business,” and “Sleepy.” The storyline centers on two men alone in the woods keeping watch over an object shrouded in white linen. The two men are known to each other, but their dynamic shifts between friendliness and rivalry as they navigate the tensions of man and nature, the known and the unknown. When a stranger finds them in the woods, their unease grows into confusion and terror and they must decide what to do next, for themselves, the stranger, and the linen-wrapped object.

As a work, A Dead Body will be notably minimal in approach. The action will unfold in near real time over the course of a single act with spare staging. This approach seeks to mimic, capture, and amplify the pacing and drama that defines Chekhov’s stories while also pushing against the bombast of opera to instead rely on the quiet and psychological to compel and affect.

A Dead Body will be scored for soprano, counter-tenor, and baritone voices and will feature an ensemble of clarinet, saxophone, violin, and percussion. A segment of this work was composed in 2018 for a workshop performance that took place during June of that year. Further promotional material, including a series of podcasts and events, can be found on Guerilla Opera’s website.

n o t e s

‘Come with me’ is a scene from a forthcoming opera (working title “Dead Body”) written with librettist Franny Zhang. The opera adapts several of Anton Chekhov’s short ghost stories. In these stories, a sense of threat hangs over a scene at night in which the characters grow increasingly suspicious and frightened. This theme, as well as Chekhov’s sense of pacing and economy are guiding principles in the libretto and music.

The opera is expected to premiere in 2020, by Guerilla Opera.

scores: not yet available for purchase; please contact for copy.

press: boston classical review