»itself between, of saying farewell« is an opera in two parts by Bridget Ferrill, Áslaug Magnúsdóttir and Olivia Rivière. Written through harp, electric harp, clarinet, voice, microphone, clavichord and electronics, the work moves through a strange and intimate parable of attachment, pain and release.

At the centre of the libretto are three figures: Shoe, Foot and Nail. Shoe is in love with Foot. Foot is leaving to find the House of Bliss. Shoe convinces Nail to impale itself through both Shoe and Foot so that they are held together. Foot continues the journey, despite the uneven step, despite the pain. Around them gather three choruses: Blood, Dust and Swan. These voices give the work its shifting terrain, moving between bodily sensation, path, weather, memory and reflection.

The opera explores how fear locates itself in the body, how devotion can harden into structure, and how care can become constraint. The language of the libretto is direct, unstable and image-rich, moving between dream logic, domestic detail, emotional analysis and theatrical address. A shoe becomes a house, a wound, a tradition, a method of attachment. A nail becomes both a fastening and a site of fear. Foot’s journey toward the House of Bliss is shaped by the weight of what has been fixed to it.

Ferrill and Magnúsdóttir’s sound world extends this drama through the fragile mechanics of plucked, keyed, blown and processed sound. Harp, clarinet and clavichord carry associations of older instrumental forms, but here they are made porous, partial and physically close. Electronics shift the scale of these materials, drawing out friction, resonance and instability. Rivière’s voice and microphone practice gives the opera a further bodily dimension, treating vocal sound as texture, utterance, breath and pressure.

The work moves between chamber opera and intimate theatre. Its emotional movement is carried through small changes of tone, repeated images and the pressure of quiet. The opera asks how a bond can be felt as shelter and injury at the same time, how a person might mistake holding for care, and how leaving can become a necessary form of attention.

Bridget Ferrill – harp, electric harp, electronics Áslaug Magnúsdóttir – clarinet, electronics Olivia Rivière – vocals, microphone Ragnar Árni Ólafsson – clavichord

Recorded 2024 to 2025 in Malmö, Copenhagen, Berlin and Reykjavík