Wytatuowane języki (Tattooed Tongues) - Martijn Padding

Martijn Padding’s multimedia opera Tatooed Tongues was staged at the Grand Theatre – Polish National Opera on 23 September 2001 during the 45th Warsaw Autumn International Festival of Contemporary Music. It was also the premiere of the first part of a Warsaw Autumn commission: the opera triptych The Land of Ulro. The eponymous book of essays by Czesław Miłosz was published in 1977 in Paris. Its title derives from William Blake’s poem Jerusalem. The Emanation of the Giant Albion, in which Ulro is a land dominated by hostility and egoism. 

Tatooed Tongues (libretto: Friso Haverkamp) is inspired by the work and figure of Emanuel Swedenborg. The other two parts of the triptych, dedicated to Oskar Władysław Miłosz and William Blake, were commissioned respectively from Osvaldas Balakauskas and Barbara Zawadzka. The triptych, revolving around the lives of three mystics, describes the nature of spiritual experience and its reflections in art. 

Tatooed Tongues was directed by Krzysztof Warlikowski. Cast of the premiere: Monique Kr s – soprano, Jacek Laszczkowski – tenor, sopranist, Hubert Claessens – bass-baritone; instrumentalists conducted by Wojciech Michniewski: Robert Nalewajka, Zenon Kitowski, Marco Blaauw, Bob Koertshuis, Coen van’t Hof, members of LOOS Ensemble from the Hague and of the Silesian Quartet.