The world premiere of Un­suk Chin’s first op­era, Alice in Won­der­land, opens the Mu­nich Op­era Fest­iv­al on 30 June 2007. Presen­ted by the Bav­ari­an State Op­era, the new work is con­duc­ted by the com­pany’s Artist­ic Dir­ect­or Kent Nagano, a lead­ing cham­pi­on of Chin’s mu­sic, and staged by Achim Frey­er. The lib­retto, based on Lewis Car­roll’s clas­sic tale, has been cre­ated by the com­poser in col­lab­or­a­tion with Dav­id Henry Hwang, au­thor of the ac­claimed and award-win­ning play M. But­ter­fly. Lewis Car­roll’s sur­real dream­like world, full of curi­ous hap­pen­ings and black hu­mour, prom­ises to finds a per­fect part­ner in Chin’s mu­sic.

The cast for Alice in Won­der­land in­cludes Sally Mat­thews in the title role, Piia Kom­si, Di­et­rich Henschel, An­drew Watts, and a cameo ap­pear­ance by Dame Gwyneth Jones as the Queen. Mod­ern op­era – se­duct­ive, en­chant­ing, sen­su­ous – and any­thing but hyper­in­tel­lec­tu­al.

“I re­gard Un­suk Chin as one of the most fas­cin­at­ing voices of our present day; [...]. Her mu­sic can nev­er be pin­pointed as hav­ing a single, spe­cif­ic style. It re­mains etern­ally fresh, ori­gin­al and full of sur­prises.” - Kent Nagano