A Journey Through Musical Hills and Valleys: Seattle Symphony’s "Iris Dévoilée"

A shining figure appears on the organ balcony, overlooking the orchestra and the audience: the leading vocalist, dressed in a vibrant Peking-style Opera costume, with an ornate headpiece that glows under the overhead light. Outside the concert hall, lanterns hang from the ceiling of Benaroya Hall, alongside a large red banner, decorated with a golden horse to celebrate the Lunar New Year. Moments before, the entryway was packed with excited guests, there to celebrate both Lunar New Year and Valentine’s Day, who watch introductory videos of Chinese Opera performances and linger to chat under the warm lights. After the audience took their seats in the symphony hall and the orchestra finished their warm-up, the night’s guest performers entered the stage, wearing brightly-colored dresses, juxtaposing the all-black outfits of the symphony.

Iris Dévoilée (Iris Unveiled), composed by Qigang Chen, mixes together Western orchestra and Peking opera techniques to create a wonderfully unique and breathtaking performance. The performances at the Seattle Symphony, conducted by Music Director Xian Zhang, were the composition's first in the United States since its showing at Carnegie Hall in 2009. The performance is made up of nine vignettes, each conveying a different mood of the main subject, who is portrayed by the renowned soprano Meng Meng. Its title hints at the varied nature of the vignettes: Iris is the Greek goddess of the rainbow, symbolizing both idealized beauty and strength.

The mix of techniques and artistic elements from around the world is a result of Chen’s background, beginning his study of music in Shanghai before studying abroad and eventually moving to Paris. Most of Chen’s recent works have included elements of traditional Chinese music, and Iris Dévoilée achieves this through the addition of three instruments, and one vocalist, that play alongside the typical Western orchestra. The erhu (a two-stringed bowed instrument), pipa (lute), and guzheng (zither), played by musicians Cathy Yang, Yang Jin, and Lucina Yue respectively, and Meng Meng’s vocals are paired with traditional Italian bel canto sopranos (Mei Gui Zhang and Tess Altiveros).

The performance begins with Ingénue (ingenuity). The orchestra plays with a bold yet hopeful tone, and the sounds of the pipa, erhu, and guzheng dance alongside it with a similarly light air. The leading soprano stays silent and seated on the organ balcony, while vocals of the bel canto sopranos blend with the instrumentals. As the first vignette ends and the second, Pudique (chastity), begins, the leading soprano rises and begins to vocalize, speaking in adoration of man while fearing that her love is unrequited. Meng Meng’s vocal style is that of the traditional Peking opera, and is high and bold in its delivery, conveying the pure emotion of the subject with few words spoken. As the subject’s emotions turned from sweet to sour, the intensity of the music increased, and the sounds of the orchestra became almost unsettling.

Alongside the mix of techniques that blend cultures together, a unique aspect of the symphony’s performance was the way each instrument and vocal part was utilized to convey each emotion. As the Libertine, the third vignette, began and the intensity of the music continued to grow, the string instruments began to mimic high-pitched shrieks while the backing sopranos sang alongside them. The human-like quality of the strings’ melody worked well to evoke strong emotion, and acted as another chorus alongside the vocalists. The backing vocalists and strings section became intertwined, as the opera vocals mimicked the steady sound of a cello or violin, while the strings conveyed the hysteria and grief of the main subject.

As each of the following vignettes are performed, the music displays a roller coaster of emotions: sensibility, tenderness, jealousy, melancholy, hysteria, and lust. The tone switched fluidly between each emotion, with the sopranos leading the orchestra through musical hills and valleys, and the orchestra providing a lush backdrop for the Chinese instruments to explore the setting. The leading soprano also performed alone at times, lamenting to the audience through high-pitched and heart-wrenching vocals. These vignettes displayed the complexity of sounds and tones in Qigang Chen’s uniquely emotional composition. The audience was captured by the somber nature of the performance, with the exception of Meng Meng’s sarcastic cry, “I am not even your wife!”

The humanity and beauty of both the vocal and instrumental performances in Iris Dévoilée magnificently convey the complexity of emotion, and the composition’s unique combination of multicultural elements is its greatest strength. The score expanded my knowledge of how musicians can interact with each other through a piece, and how contrasting sounds can blend together to create something new. The composition relies on its music to convey every detail about its subject, but the musicians at the Seattle Symphony performance did an incredible job bringing the character to life. Every emotion that the subject felt was portrayed with great depth by the vocalists and orchestra, and that emotion could be felt throughout the room throughout the performance.

Lead photo by Jon Pendleton.

The TeenTix Newsroom is a group of teen writers led by the Teen Editorial Staff. The Teen Editorial Staff is made up of 5 teens who curate the review portion of the TeenTix blog. For each review, Newsroom writers work individually with a teen editor to polish their writing for publication. 

The TeenTix Press Corps promotes critical thinking, communication, and information literacy through criticism and journalism practice for teens. For more information about the Press Corps program see HERE.