The Curing Line

About

The Curing Line is a new opera by Irish composer Michael Gallen, with a libretto by Annemarie Ní Churreáin, presented as the French premiere at Festival Musica 2026. The work is shaped by opposing forces, where ancestral knowledge meets the urgency of an electrified present. The score brings together a collective of multi-talented performers from operatic, traditional, pop and experimental music backgrounds who combine acting, singing and instrumental practice, joined on stage by a choir that gives voice to sean-nós — a highly ornamented Irish singing tradition — interwoven with incantatory motifs, industrial sounds, and bodily pulses. Staging and visuals are conceived by Shawn Fitzgerald Ahern (direction and video design) together with Laura Rainsford (projection design) and Simon Cullen (video design), with set and costume design by Pai Rathaya and lighting by Yukiko Yoshimoto, producing a committed, polyphonic work in which healing becomes a matter of memory, community, and transformation.