Research Seminar Series - Dr Robert Fokkens

February 26th, 1- 3pm KCT4 King's College/ Teams

Dr Robert Fokkens, Cardiff University 

My creative work in combining music, voice, text and theatre has always involved approaches which explore the inherent intersectionality and imaginative potential of the medium, rather than the received limitations and restrictions of the operatic genre and industry. Works such as Contact (2010), Love Songs (2011), Flights into Darkness (2009), The Application (2015), and Bhekizizwe (2020) all explore spaces between the oppositional ideas which often dominate the debate around opera, including notions of high and low art; the genre distinctions between opera, music theatre, musicals and total theatre; and the divide between Global North and Africa. More recent work with Music Theatre Wales where I have been part of a creative team making The Jollof House Party Opera (2023) and The Things That Go Unnoticed (2022) continue in this vein, exploring respectively the intersections between rap, food and opera, and the varied creative interests of young people within a musical-dramatic space. 

I have come, through this work,  to the view that its intrinsically liminal nature provides a valuable position from which to consider how to respond creatively to the often challenging public debates surrounding the place of opera in culture today. Drawing on my experience working in opera - developing new work in this medium and devising and managing an Impact project around Bhekizizwe in 2022, my knowledge of other recent work in the medium, working with Music Theatre Wales, and engaging in various research fora which are actively exploring the future of opera from a range of perspectives - I will seek to articulate the questions driving my own work and that of other creators working innovatively in this world. In closing, I will seek to bring these ideas into focus by introducing The Fisherman, a new music theatre project I am currently developing with librettist Mkhululi Mabija. 

Bio:

Robert Fokkens’ music is performed and broadcast internationally, published by Composers Edition and Tetractys Publishing, and recorded on ECM, Nimbus, Métier, Herald, Naxos, First Hand and other labels.

Robert’s music uses techniques and materials learned from many musical worlds, creating music of twisted cycles and microtonal inflections described as ‘hilarious’, ‘sad [and] strange…express[ing] more than anything else’ (Times). Recently, his opera Bhekizizwe was premiered in Wales (2022), his violin/cello duo Pier Music was premiered and toured in the UK by David Adams and Alice Neary, and the European premiere of Mzantsi Nights was performed and broadcast in Germany by Ensemble Modern (2023).