A passion for opera

‘Since I have synesthesia, I instinctively focus on creating a staging that harmonises music and movement’

ANNA ETSUKO TSURI, founder of New York’s Opera Pomme Rouge

As a college student in Japan, I came to realise that I had an unusual attribute: I am a musical/visual synesthete. Not everyone conjures pictures and images when they hear sounds, but it comes absolutely naturally to me – in fact I find it difficult to avoid.

Since my youth, I’ve been a musical actress, pianist, flautist and conductor, so the stage is a familiar place for me. Over time, my attention has been focused more and more on opera, and especially opera directing. After I graduated from a music college in Tokyo with majors in flute and conducting, I moved to Germany to study opera directing at the Hans Eisler Hochschule für Musik in Berlin. And so my long journey into opera began.

I was the first Japanese candidate to pass the entrance exam for opera directing at the Hochschule and I worked as an assistant director at the Bayreuth Young Artists Festival during the summers of 2003 and 2004, an experience that gave me a deep understanding of Wagner. At the end of that second summer in Bayreuth, I jumped at the opportunity to assist Christine Mielitz at Dortmund Opera. This was a chance to work with an huge influential figure: Mielitz was a disciple of the great Götz Friedlich and a trailblaizer for women opera directors.