Thomalla: Dark Fall

Nationaltheater-Orchester Mannheim, Pierson, Alan

OC 2000

Dark Fall is an opera about love and longing in old age. The story centres on Ellen, a married woman who is showing the first signs of Alzheimer's disease. Despite these symptoms, or perhaps because of them, she falls in love with Owen, an old friend who visits Ellen and her husband.

Dark Fall questions notions about love and partnership in old age: When are we too ill or too old to be allowed to fall in love again? to start a new life with a new partner and be able to leave someone else? when are we too limited in our autonomy to freely decide our lives?

Together with Dark Spring (UA Mannheim 2020), Dark Fall is conceived as the second part of a theatrical Diptych of Desire. The pieces can be performed either separately or together as a double feature.

Works:

•Thomalla: Dark Fall: One, two, three, four
•Thomalla: Dark Fall: No. 1 Aria: Why Don’t You Listen? (Curtis)
• Thomalla: Dark Fall
•Thomalla: Dark Fall: No. 4 Aria: What Is Going On With You, Ellen? (Ellen)
•Thomalla: Dark Fall: You must be Owen (Ilse, Owen)
•Thomalla: Dark Fall: No. 5 Song: Learn This, Do That! (Owen)
•Thomalla: Dark Fall: Welcome! (Curtis, Ellen, Ilse, Owen)
•Thomalla: Dark Fall: No. 3B Quartet: Wednesday We Smash the Patriarchy! (Curtis, Ellen, Ilse, Owen)
• Thomalla: Dark Fall: Zwischenmusik 1 / Interlude 1
•Thomalla: Dark Fall: Look, these journals (Ellen, Ilse)
•Thomalla: Dark Fall: No. 6 Aria: Sometimes I Feel (Ilse)
•Thomalla: Dark Fall: It Looks like the attempt to put order in all your things (Ellen, Owen)
•Thomalla: Dark Fall: No. 7 Duet: Nothing Seems As It Used To Be (Ellen, Owen)
• Thomalla: Dark Fall: Look! It´s Curtis, you, and me! (Ellen, Owen)
•Thomalla:Dark Fall: Ellen, what happened here? (Curtis, Ellen)

CD x 2

Oehms Classics

20.04.2026

4260330920003