The only American finalist for the 2016 International Opera Award for Best Opera Company, Opera Philadelphia scored a fresh triumph this past week, when it launched the season with the world premiere of Breaking the Waves, a new company co-commission inspired by Lars von Trier’s searing Oscar-nominated 1996 film, from the creative team of Missy Mazzoli, Royce Vavrek, and James Darrah. With three performances still to come (Sep 27 & 29; Oct 1), the critical response has already been unanimously euphoric; as the Philadelphia Inquirer notes, the season’s opening week has succeeded in “effectively demonstrat[ing] Opera Philadelphia’s growing presence and ambitions.”

Declaring the opera “ambitious, accomplished, [and] dramatically direct,” the New York Times pointed out:

“It is not easy to find new operas that command attention, tell their story lucidly and create a powerful, permeating mood. Dark and daring, Breaking the Waves does all this with sensitivity and style.”

For the Wall Street Journal, Breaking the Waves was “savage, heartbreaking and thoroughly original,” while for Parterre, it was, quite simply: “the most startling and moving new American opera in memory.”

The Philadelphia Inquirer affirmed:

“Unquestionably, Opera Philadelphia has developed, produced, and premiered a powerful, fully realized, artistically significant piece with Breaking the Waves. The creative team of long-promising artists … all seem to surpass themselves simultaneously and with a common dramatic purpose.” 

As a result, Opera News reported, the audience was held “spellbound.” The review continued:

“Mazzoli’s music lived up to the hype her work has engendered: Breaking the Waves stands among the best 21st-century American operas yet produced.”

The New York Times shared this assessment of the music:

“Harmonies seethe and drone at the base of the new score, as implacable yet changeable as the omnipresent sea. … Ms. Mazzoli sets the language with passionate clarity, … confidently creat[ing] a range of densities, from symphonic weightiness to agile sparseness. 

Likewise, the Wall Street Journal found:

“Mr. Vavrek’s spare, eloquent libretto leaves ample space for Ms. Mazzoli’s music to create a complex portrait of Bess and her stark environment. … Ms. Mazzoli’s score deftly balances trenchant arias with a kaleidoscopic orchestration whose layers and colors suggest Messiaen, Britten and Janáček but is finally all her own.”

The Philadelphia Inquirer was equally impressed by the production:

“Darrah’s stage direction is incredibly precise when charting the opera’s progression from representational reality into something more nightmarish. … The narrative’s final (miraculous) musical effect is a stunner.”

The performances, especially that of soprano Kiera Duffy, who created the role of Bess (played by Emily Watson in von Trier’s film), drew similar praise. The Philadelphia Inquirer wrote:

“Performances under conductor Steven Osgood were assured on every level. … But the evening belonged to soprano Duffy. … Her acting had physical assurance, but, less tangibly, you cared about her from the moment she entered the stage.”

The New York Times also singled her out:

 “The fearless, focused soprano Kiera Duffy, … singing with the cool roundedness of melting ice, creates a subtly ambivalent portrait of a woman both self-important and persecuted.”

The Wall Street Journal elaborated:

“Classic tragic opera heroines may weep and die, but Bess, as conceived by Ms. Mazzoli and librettist Royce Vavrek, and sung by the extraordinary Kiera Duffy, is an evolving, unforgettable character. … Ms. Duffy embodied Bess in a fearless vocal and physical performance, her gleaming soprano finding all the colors of poignant innocence.”