SYNOPSIS:

Armida, a new 50-minute music drama created especially for Channel 4 Television. A collaboration between Judith Weir, one of the UK's leading composers, and award-winning film director Margaret Williams, Armida is a thrilling contemporary love story set in a war zone, charting the passionate relationship between Armida, a television journalist and Rinaldo, an army officer.

While not set in a specific time and place, its desert backdrop is powerfully evocative of many recent conflicts. The opening score blends contemporary opera with the fragmented sounds of conflict – staccato gunfire and radio interference. The libretto is in English and makes use of colloquial dialogue and speech to create a spontaneous, natural operatic language.

Building on the techniques and success of her earlier opera films, director Margaret Williams recorded the performers ' singing live on location in Morocco that gives an immediacy and intensity to their performance.

C R E D I T S :

D I R E C T O R
Margaret Williams

C O M P O S E R
Judith Weir

D I R E C T O R   O F   P H O T O G R A P H Y
Michel Baudour

C A S T :
Talise Trevigne
Kenneth Tarver
Grant Doyle
Olivier Dumait
Dean Robinson
Nicholas Folwell
Donna Bateman

C O N D U C T O R
Philip Headlam

B A N D
The Continuum Ensemble

M U S I C   P R O D U C E R S
Nicholas Parker
Colin Matthews

M U S I C   E N G I N E E R S
Mike Hatch
Huw Walker

C A S T I N G
John Owen

M O R O C C A N   P R O D U C T I O N MANAGER
Ahmed ‘Jimmy' Abounouom

A S S I S T A N T   D I R E C T O R
Alain Aswani

E D I T OR
Daniel Goddard

L I N E   P R O D U C E R
Caroline Freeman

A N I M A T E U R
Nick Herrett

P R O D U C E R
Anne Beresford

M J W   P R O D U C T I O N S

Return to Music