Brancato and Weiss: ‘Infinitesimal’ Live at World Heart Beat

South London’s inspirational World Heart Beat Music Academy is hosting a special season celebrating all things vocal and I was treated to an intimate evening of modern chamber opera.

Previous guest on Harmonious World, pianist and composer Nicole Brancato, has worked with baritone Jeremy Weiss to create Infinitesimal, based on groundbreaking research about near-death experiences. The first performance was in front of the audience in London’s Nine Elms as part of ‘Season of the Song’.

The music is quite extraordinary, with lyrics that bring to life the memories that might pass through your mind at the end of your life. Director Kevin Newbury brought the production to life and, together with an impressive technical crew around them, Nicole and Jeremy portray moments from their own lives.

The sparse props used are all vital and meaningful, with a traditional radio that seems to convey the work of real scientists who have researched the brain at the end of life. Hearing the voices of those experts as they punctuate the opera brings a sense of reality.

Nicole and Jeremy worked together on the libretto before the piano and voice brought it all together in preparation for the production. Each of them tells stories that may or may not be real and remembered. Those props - a suitcase that becomes a mirror and a screen; a rucksack containing autumn leaves and meaningful photos; the radio that many of us still remember from our childhoods - work visually alongside the sonic world of piano and voice.

Immediately prior to the performance I saw, Nicole and Jeremy joined by a group of young students from a local school. Their questions seemed to pre-empt some of the lyrics that they hadn’t even heard, and they were fascinated by the life of musicians - many of them were at World Heart Beat to experience music hands-on thanks to the marvellous work of the organisation behind the venue.

Infinitesimal is desperately moving and intimate, exploring the connections between humans, both each performer and the audience. The team behind the production brought movingly a sense of possibility in death in our own relationships and reminiscences.

The tour is continuing, so I urge you to explore this production when it arrives at a venue near you. Find out more here.