A decade ago, Stockhausen's gargantuan seven-part operatic cycle LICHT seemed on the verge of a complete performance, then faded away. A 2004 BBC News story announced that a production was planned in Dresden in 2008, in conjunction with Stockhausen's eightieth birthday. Sadly, the composer lived to see neither. Hopes are surging again with a report by Erik Voermans, in the Amsterdam paper Het Parool, to the effect that the director Pierre Audi is looking into the idea of mounting a complete LICHT at Amsterdam's Gashouder space in 2019. Voermans cautions that the project is still in the "research phase." When asked about the scheme, Audi said, "Nothing to report about Stockhausen." And when I directed an inquiry to the Park Avenue Armory — mentioned as a potential collaborator — a spokesperson told me that "currently there are no plans" to produce the cycle there. Still, as Voermans later commented on Twitter, "If anyone can pull it off, it's Mr. Audi." In the meantime, Stockhausenites can proceed to Basel in June for a production of Donnerstag.
Photo: One of the Mittwoch helicopters in Birmingham, 2012.
