Into The Little Hill

2023

Into the Little Hill, composed by George Benjamin with a libretto by Martin Crimp, premiered in Canada at the SFU Goldcorp Centre for the Arts in May 2023. Presented by Astrolabe Musik Theatre in partnership with SFU Woodward’s Cultural Programs, this chamber opera delivers a  retelling of the Pied Piper legend—recontextualized as a haunting reflection on societal othering and the consequences of refusing responsibility .

The production fused live music—including bass flute, basset horn, mandolin, and banjo—with physical storytelling in a multidisciplinary format, seamlessly weaving dance, music, and drama.

Hana Rutka joined as one of three movement artists, alongside Juolin Lee and Daria Mikhaylyuk, their choreography by Idan Cohen extending the opera’s emotional undercurrent into physical form. Their dancing served as a visceral chorus—at once expressive, disquieting, and tenderly embodied—emerging behind and around the singers with poignant physical metaphor.

Visually, the production invoked Weimar-era expressionism with stylized makeup, bold lighting, and costume designs by Elena Razlog, while Victoria Bell’s lighting and Cohen’s choreography framed the dancers in fleeting, poetic tableaux. The opera’s own soundscape—punishing in its extremes, elegantly executed—was anchored by the conductor Leslie Dala and the versatile voices of Heather Pawsey and Emma Parkinson.