Instrumentation: Mezzo-Soprano, Tenor, Baritone, Piano
Duration: 7 minutes
Year: 2025
Program Notes
Libretto: Christene A. Browne
Composer: Roydon Tse
Language: English/Latin/Lingua Ignota
In “Sordes” (Latin for “filth”), librettist Christene A. Browne created a boldly irreverent operatic scene that transforms the most mundane of human experiences into high art. This brief work, developed for Tapestry Opera’s LibLab program, tries to find profound meaning in the profane.
The opera centers on a fictional character inspired by the 12th-century Benedictine abbess, mystic, and composer Hildegard of Bingen—one of history’s most remarkable polymaths who wrote extensively on theology, medicine, and natural philosophy. This towering medieval intellect encounters the decidedly unglamorous reality of a contemporary gender-neutral public restroom, where her lofty spiritual ideals collide with basic human biology.
What begins as a simple bathroom visit quickly escalates into a comedic confrontation about cleanliness, responsibility, and social decorum. Oscar, a pragmatic everyman, represents the casual acceptance of life’s messy realities, while Hildegard embodies moral outrage at what she perceives as a fundamental breach of decency. The Janitor, meanwhile, serves as the weary voice of experience, having witnessed humanity’s full spectrum of bathroom behavior.
Score Sample
Roydon Tse 