ELNA - Dead Pope on Trial!Cecilia Ore
Dead Pope on Trial!
A madrigal comedy for vocal ensemble of choir
Instrumentation: sop, mez, alt, ten, bar, bass
or
ch[S.S.A.A.T.B.B.]
All the solo parts indicated with "solo" should be performed solo also when
the piece is performed by a choir.
Cecilie Ore’s Dead Pope on Trial! tells the absurd – but true! – story of Formosus, a 9th century pope who was accused of crimes and had his claim to the papacy challenged after his death. His body was exhumed and dressed in formal garb to be put on trial, in a process that became increasingly grotesque – “But how do you punish a corpse?”. The vocal ensemble suggests a gossiping mob trying to wrap their heads around the bizarre events unfolding around them.
Siri Landgren
Cecilie Ore (b. 1954) studied piano at the Norwegian Academy of Music and in Paris (1974–81), followed by composition at the Institute of Sonology in Utrecht and with Ton de Leeuw at the Sweelinck Conservatory in Amsterdam (1981–86).
In the 1980s, she gained international recognition for works such as Calliope (1984), Helices
(1985), and
Porphyre
(1986). Her electro-acoustic work
Etapper
(1988) earned both 1st and 2nd prizes at the International Rostrum for Electro-Acoustic Music, and
Porphyre
was awarded “Work of the Year” by the Norwegian Composers’ Association.
Ore's exploration of time as a musical concept led to two major tetralogies: Codex Temporis (1989–92) and Tempura Mutantur (1997–99), followed by the “cloud” cycle, including Cirrus (2002) and Cirrostratus (2004). In the 2000s, she shifted focus to vocal and text-based works, premiering A – a shadow opera (2001) and Schwirren (2003), and later creating politically engaged pieces addressing themes like capital punishment and freedom of speech.
Her opera Adam & Eve – a Divine Comedy premiered at the Bergen International Festival in 2015. The same year, she received the Lindeman Prize. Other notable works include the satirical Vatican Trilogy (2016–18), and the H2O Trilogy for string quartet (2018–2020), for which she received both the Edvard Prize (2019) and the Music Publishers Prize (2023).
Ore continues to explore the interplay between text and instrumentation in recent works such as Katsu! (2021), Hototogisu! (2022), and Lex Naturae (2023). She was a visiting professor at the Norwegian Academy of Music from 2020 to 2023.
