“Master Deceiver”

In this necrowaltz, Demons frenetically praise their leader in both song and dance, to a theme consisting of sped-up and grotesque embellishments of the plainsong motif we heard in “The Friendship Waltz”. During the eventual peak of their manic glee over the prospect of more human eternal damnation, the voice of God is suddenly and shockingly heard in one word: “Enough!!” The now shrieking and wailing wraiths scatter in terror.

God’s following few and loud words to them speak of the young woman in the same way that He famously spoke to Satan of “My servant Job” in the Bible. We then see the young woman, and hear her plaintively giving up on ever again attempting to help bring her friends to Christ. Judging from what she has just heard from them, she now feels that such an attempt is futile.

But suddenly, we hear angels voicing robust encouragement, exhorting her to “Go!!” We hear this audibly, but she hears with her heart. She resolves to go to her friends, and to try one last time: She will share the Good News with them herself — and on their turf this time.

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Tags: damnation, dance of death, demon, doom, encouragement, eternity, evil, friends, Hell, impending doom, modern opera, revel, sad, Satan, shofar, totentanz


 “Friendship Faltz”

Its title parodying that of “The Friendship Waltz”, as well as more subtly suggesting the words “false” and “faults”, this minor-key embellishment of the former work once again features the group of four friends, who, short of blissfully singing simplistic songs about the supposed meaning of life, as they did before, now instead begin to shallowly gossip against their “friend”, the young woman whom they recently abandoned — and who now covertly is overhearing them, having just now arrived to try and talk with them again.

Though hurtful and sad to the young woman, her friends’ current behavior is simply delightful to one character in particular, and proves to be precisely what that “Master Deceiver” has been attempting to arrange, as we discover in the following piece, which bears Satan’s title.

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Tags: Christians, complain, damnation, demons, doom, eternity, evil, friends, gossip, impending doom, modern opera, sad, Satan


 “The Lie”

A new scene opens, in which Satan boasts aloud of his unparalleled skill in deception. He smugly muses over just how very simple it is for him to lead mankind to their ultimate destruction. After he’s finished gloating in soliloquy, the young Christian woman enters the scene with her four friends, her clearly having decided in favor of her love for her friends, over and against her own personal and immediate emotional need to grieve over the recent death of her brother.

Satan then stands nearby, unseen by all except us, as a strange man approaches the group. Satan exerts a strong spiritual influence over the man, feeding him a powerful urge to bully the young group and to block their path. Satan also puts into the man brilliantly deceptive things to say, in order to dissuade the group, or at least some of its members, from proceeding and attending the church event.

The young woman humbly relies upon the wisdom of God within her to successfully answer the man’s subtle arguments and strong accusations. But her four friends eventually believe the boor, heed his clever lies and discouragements, and forsake her one by one.

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Tags: argue, bully, Christian concert, chruch, clever, debate, deception, demonic possession, evil, friends, Gospel, modern opera, sacrifice, sad, salvation, Satan, subtlety, young woman


 “The Fall”

The opera begins with a lone angel, sitting high up and in the distance. He is solemnly and slowly poring over a large Book, first at the left-hand page, then at the right. The angel slowly shakes his head in sadness, bows it, and closes the Book.

The next scene is a battlefield during wartime. Both the geographical area and the soldiers’ uniforms are generic, but a time period slightly in the future is suggested by the presence of armed female combatants marching with males and in equal numbers. The soldiers are singing a military march which boasts of their power. Very soon, though, all are killed by a powerful land mine blast.

In the next scene, they are spirits. A large shadow of a pointing hand appears on the curtain: God tells the spirits to “Depart”. Next, there is silence and almost total darkness. The spirits are wondering where they are and what has happened. Satan appears, and explains that they now belong to him. He has a lot of cruel fun with the full explanation, holding back information and dragging out the process for as long as amuses him. The spirits simply cannot accept their new reality at first. But toward the end of this scene, they realize their doom in full. With profound sorrow and regret, they finally accept their most grim of all fates, and their wills melt into eternal defeat. A circle made up of demons rapidly closes in upon the spirits as this ultra-tragic piece ends.

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Tags: battlefield, damnation, death, demon, disturbing, evil, fate, God, Hell, inspiring, land mine, military march, modern opera, sad, Satan, soliders, soul, spirit, terror, tragedy, unsettling, war

A single story thread runs through both operas, beginning in “Project Eternity” and ending with its sequel, “Vengeance”. I should explain the meanings of the two titles here. “Project Eternity” refers simply to God’s wish and various attempts to bring each of us to Heaven. The title “Vengeance” refers to Satan’s expressed vow of retribution against our protagonist, the unnamed young Christian woman, for her indirectly sharing the Gospel with a prostitute, who overhears it as the Christian woman is explaining eternal salvation to a friend. Her friend disdainfully rejects the message and leaves, but the prostitute who overhears it feels moved by God to repent, and, then and there, privately turns her life over to Him. She enters Heaven in the final scene of “Project Eternity”. Satan is livid at this turn of events; after all, he had owned that woman’s soul, and she would have been his to torment forever — until the Christian woman came along and interfered. Thus, in “Vengeance”, Satan takes out his wrath in full upon our protagonist.

Tags: angel, chorus, Christian, classical music, demon, God, Jesus Christ, modern opera, Satan