Echoes of Bi-Sotoon is a new opera by Cultureland Opera Collective. It’s in nine scenes based on the legends and the iconography of the Bi-Sotoon mountain; an important cultural site and transportation route in Khermanshah province in present day Iran.  It includes music by seven BIPOC composers[1] co-ordinated by artistic director Afarin Mansouri.  It premiered at Arrayspace on Thursday evening.

There are three main elements to the narrative.  The first concerns the Black Fish (Taline Yeremian) and the bird Simorgh (Alex Hajek) who seek love and truth on the banks of the Gamasiab river.  There’s then an interlude dealing with the important and famous Beshtun inscription of the early Achmaenid king Darius I (Alexander Dobson).  Finally, there’s the most substantial part; the story of how King Khosrow (Alexander Cappellazzo) uses deception to keep the lovers Farhad (Gabriel Sanchez-Ortega) and Princess Shirin (Kathryn Rose Johnston) apart which provides a legendary explanation for the mountain’s topography and iconography.  It’s all held together by a Narrator; Maryam Zunuzi, inspired by a Persian style of story telling called Naghalli.

That’s a lot to cram into 75 minutes or so but it works pretty well.  Six singers, a piano (Cheryl Duval), speakers for electronics and a backdrop for some rather brilliant projections (Setareh Delzendeh; who also designed highly effective costumes and the set), not to mention Dr. Rob Simms with his tambour solo is also a lot to cram into the very limited stage area of Arrayspace but director Renee Salewski managed it vey well.

Musically it hangs together pretty well considering that the composers really had no opportunity to work together.  The vocal line (it’s sung in a mixture of Farsi and English) was pretty interesting and there was effective use of prerecorded ambient sounds and middle eastern instruments.  The piano writing was a bit patchy.  I liked some of it a lot but other bits sounded like rather repetitive stock musical theatre tropes.  All in all though very satisfying musically.

There was some very strong singing across the board.  It’s a tiny space and these are not tiny voices!  The English was all clearly understandable and I’m told the Farsi diction was good too.  The acting; especially given the limited space and very limited prep time, was engaging.  All in all it was a most enjoyable show; especially if one is a bit of a Graeco-Persian history nerd.

fn1: The composers:

Negin Zomorrodi/ Spain
Mojgan Misaghi/ Texas/ USA
Rachel McFarlane/ Boston/ Canada
Arghavan Niroumand/ Tehran/ Iran
Nasim Nabavi/ Iran
Neda Edalatjoo/ Iran
Sina Fallah/Toronto/ Canada