Long-Lost Opera Discovered off the Coast of Sicily
“Twitter War” Yields “Financial Opera”
Tweets by Estonian President Toomas Hendrik Ilves were the inspiration for Scott Diel and Eugene Birman's new cantata, Nostra Culpa.(Photo: Twitter)
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Tweets by Estonian President Toomas Hendrik Ilves were the inspiration for Scott Diel and Eugene Birman's new cantata, Nostra Culpa.(Photo: Twitter)
An American economist, the president of Estonia, a writer and an opera composer have collided at the crossroads of international fiscal policy, social media and art, resulting in a new musical work inspired by the global Great Recession, according to The Christian Science Monitor.
What has been called a “Twitter war” between Princeton economist and The New York Times columnist Paul Krugman and Toomas Hendrik Ilves, the president of Estonia, has prompted Latvian-born composer Eugene Birman and Estonia-based American writer Scott Diel to create a so-called “financial opera” – Nostra Culpa – to premiere this spring in Estonia’s capital, Tallinn.
After Krugman wrote a blog post last June criticizing the Estonian government’s economic austerity measures, Ilves responded with some now-famous tweets on Twitter. “Let’s write about something we know nothing about & be smug, overbearing & patronizing: after all, they’re just wogs,” Ilves wrote, along with, “But yes, what do we know? We’re just dumb & silly East Europeans. Unenlightened. Someday we too will understand. Nostra culpa.”
Diel picked up on this exchange, and the idea for Nostra Culpa, a cantata or soprano and string orchestra, was born. Nostra culpa premieres in April.
Read more: Estonian Austerity, Paul Krugman and Twitter: All the Elements of an Opera? (CSM)
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