PER NØRGÅRD
Nuit des Hommes
Markus Falkbring, viola
Helene Gjerris, mezzo soprano
Andreas Hagman, violin
Fredrik Lindström, cello
Helge Rønning, tenor
Bodil Rørbech, violin
Gert Sørensen, percussion

Per Nørgård, composer
Kaare Hansen, conductor

About
War as purgation. War as aphrodisiac. War as destruction. Per Nørgård’s fifth opera Nuit des Hommes (‘The Night of Mankind') invites us into the French poet Guillaume Apollinaire’s hectic dream about the world war that was later called ‘a dress rehearsal for the end of the world’.

In Nuit des Hommes we encounter the two faces of war. The military music is compared to a blushing cheek; titles like ‘Plethora’ and ‘In Praise of the War' illustrate Apollinaire’s complex experience of the war that surrounded him. Fascination is accompanied by loathing, and pleasure and suffering join hands. ‘The Night of Mankind’ is about the perversion of the erotic, about ruin as the feast of the senses, about dissolution and passionate death-longing.

Nuit des Hommes is written for mezzo-soprano, tenor, string quartet, percussion and electronics. The opera lasts an hour and has two acts divided into twenty scenes. The percussionist Gert Sørensen has produced Dacapo’s CD recording.

Reviews
A wholly persuasive realization of what, conceptually and musically, is surely the most forwardlooking stage work to have emerged in Europe over the past decade.
(International Record Review)

Dette er Nørgårds mest helstøbte opera overhovedet … Det er musik der gør ondt og kun mere, fordi den også er smuk
(Politiken)

Eine weitere Meisterleistung des dänischen Labels dacapo, das sich mehr und mehr zeitgenössischen Komponisten in Dänemark widmet. Das Label macht mit dieser Platte einmal mehr ein interessantes und hierzulande kaum gespieltes Werke zugänglich. Alle Achtung.
(***** 05/04-2006 Klassik.com)

Credits
Recorded at Mox Studio in December 2003
Recording producer: Gert Sørensen
Sound engineer: Henrik Vindeby
Editing and mastering: Gert Sørensen
Graphic design: Elevator

Dacapo acknowledge, with gratitude, the financial support of Sonning-Fonden and KODA’s National Funds