His Salt Skin

Instrumentation: 2.2.2.2.-4.3.3.1.-tmp.-3 perc.-hp.-org(optional).-mzsop.-cnt.-bari.-chorus.-strings

Perc: tuned gongs, bell plates, tubular bells, suspended cymbal, sizzle cymbal, tam-tam, crotales, wind gong, bass drum, water gong.

Commissioned by the Three Choirs Festival, BBC National Orchestra of Wales and Philharmonie Zuidphil. Libretto by Francesca Simon

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PROGRAMME NOTE

Cantata for mezzo-soprano, countertenor, baritone, chorus and orchestra.

The Fisherman and his Wife live in a croft by the sea, unhappy and childless. The Fisherman goes off each day to kill seals and catch fish while the Wife stays home lonely and unloved.

One day after a seal hunt they find a wounded, naked man – the Stranger – washed up on the shore. They take him home and nurse him back to health. This is not a man however, but a Selkie – a shape shifting creature who is a Seal in the sea and a Man on the land. The Stranger’s beguiling sexuality disrupts their lives and opens their eyes to a world of terrifying intimacy as he seduces them both. Then one day, out on a boat with the Fisherman, the Stranger vanishes and returns to the Sea. The Fisherman believes he has drowned.

Six months later the wife has a child – a boy with berry-brown eyes, long dark hair, and silky skin. One night when the Fisherman is out on his boat, the Stranger returns, tells the Wife he is a selkie, and takes the boy with him to swim the sea. The Wife tries to follow them beneath the waves but cannot.

The next night the Fisherman returns with his catch: a dead male seal and its cub. He enters the cold croft and urges his Wife to come out and admire their fine pelts. In the moonlight they discover not a seal and its cub, but the corpses of the Stranger and her baby.

The Fisherman and his Wife are united in grief for the Stranger they both loved, and the child.

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