Arctic Fever. Comedia harmonica
No composer other that Alek Nowak could possibly turn Marcin Wicha’s book into a vaudeville (Things). This time, it was the writer who came up with a subject – the dramatic fates of two polar explorers, Ejnar Mikkelsen and Iver Iversen, stranded for three years amid the ice of Greenland. Since a journey to Greenland had been the composer’s childhood dream (unfulfilled so far, despite an undertaken attempt), the two artists immediately found a common ground.
Arctic Fever’s subtitle comedia harmonica, referring to a genre from the borderland between the madrigal and the earliest musical drama, shows Nowak playing with the operatic conventions again. ‘Tragedy is easy – comedy is hard’, runs the cliché. Nowak sticks to it in his musical narration presented by AUKSO Chamber Orchestra of the City of Tychy and the Capella Cracoviensis singers. The composer notes in his Log: ‘When you finally sail beyond the seventh horizon and stand on the most distant of the unconquered shores, when you take a deep breath and calmly look around, after standing for a moment, you realize that this entire universe is essentially immensely, mercilessly, unbearably and deadly boring.’ This sad conclusion matches the note of melancholy and unfulfillment that can be detected in this ‘comedy’.
Following the premiere of the work (at Auksodrone festival on 5 October 2024), questions were asked concerning further collaborations between the two perfectionists, Nowak the master of sound and Wicha – of the word. Still, we are only mortals, and life wrote a different scenario. We will meet Marcin no more at the premiere of this record in Tychy…
- Words: Marcin Wicha
- Series: ANAKLASIS
- No. of edition: 1
- Published: 2025
- Type: CD
