About the work
Mittwoch aus Licht (Wednesday from Light) is the sixth-composed of the seven operas in Karlheinz Stockhausen's cycle Licht – The Seven Days of the Week, written in 1995–1997. It was the last of the cycle to receive a staged premiere: only on 22 August 2012 did the Birmingham Opera Company bring the work fully to the stage – more than four years after Stockhausen's death. Wednesday is the day of cosmic collaboration and reconciliation, on which Michael, Eve and Lucifer no longer appear in conflict but in cooperation.
Plot
The opera consists of a greeting, four scenes and a farewell. "World Parliament" is an a cappella scene in which a choir, as a world parliament, debates the concept of love. "Orchestra Finalists" shows individual orchestral musicians in surreal solos evoking animals and elements. The "Helicopter String Quartet" – the most famous scene – has a string quartet play in four flying helicopters, whose sound and image are transmitted live into the hall. In "Michaelion", finally, a cosmic radio station takes over the leadership of the world, with a singing camel and Michael as ambassador. The "Wednesday Farewell" releases the audience into electronic sounds.
Cultural significance
Mittwoch aus Licht contains, in the "Helicopter String Quartet", one of the most spectacular and most discussed ideas in the history of music: music literally relocated into the sky. The opera was long considered unperformable and was only fully realised posthumously. It unites utopian world-theatre, technical daring and the finest humour, and stands for Stockhausen's vision of a boundary-crossing, cosmic art. Like the entire cycle, Wednesday too is developed entirely from the three-layered superformula of Michael, Eve and Lucifer.