Visual Artist.
Lighting Designer.
Two conceptions of the world separated by a single threshold: one embodies reason and light, the other is elemental, dark, and irrational. One night a charismatic Shepherd enters the Christian court of King Roger, shattering the established order of Christian values and ways of seeing. Does his teaching bring joy and goodness—or only ruin and chaos?
The opera Król Roger by the Polish composer Karol Szymanowski offers no unequivocal answer. Szymanowski himself described the work as a mystery play whose central theme is human self-knowledge, sexuality, and spirituality.
The piece—first performed in 1924—was inspired by the composer’s journey to Sicily, a land steeped in monuments of ancient, Oriental, and early-Christian culture. That journey led him to focus on the historical figure of King Roger II, who ruled the island in the 12th century and whose court was a meeting place of Christian and Arab philosophy. Szymanowski’s fascination with antiquity and Oriental exoticism permeates the score, which blends Impressionist colors with echoes of Arabic music.
The Brno opera stage will present this singular work for the very first time, in a production that also marks the local debut of Vladimír John—a young, gifted director and recent JAMU graduate who impressed Brno audiences with his graduation production last season.
Premiere: 13 June 2025, Janáček Theatre