‘I might become the art myself,” sings the artist Katsushika Hokusai in the new opera by composer Dai Fujikura and librettist Harry Ross. And here he is, doing just that: played by the baritone Daisuke Ohyama, with the forces of Scottish Opera ranged around him.
Over five acts, The Great Wave gives us episodes from Hokusai’s life and death, beginning with his funeral then continuing in flashback, including a dream sequence in which he encounters the wave that inspired his most famous print. As you might expect, it looks beautiful. The production is the work of an all-Japanese team headed by the director Satoshi Miyagi, and it’s full of Hokusai’s pictures, projected upon the bamboo walls of Junpei Kiz’s set, which reflect the artist’s barrel-shaped coffin. It often sounds beautiful, too: Fujikura uses the shakuhachi – a recorder-like flute, played by Shozan Hasegawa – as the basis for a light-infused soundworld conjuring openness and simplicity in almost Copland-esque style, made piquant with fluttering, elusive orchestral textures.
