[Language: French with Burnt-in French Subtitles]

A modern tragedy, Daral Shaga retraces the parallel destinies of emigrants, those returning and those heading towards a better future. Their geographical utopia is reflected in the artistic utopia of the project, which mixes opera, circus skills, and video. Pushing themselves to their respective limits, Kris Defoort, Laurent Gaudé, winner of the Prix Goncourt, and the director Fabrice Murgia join forces to tell a story that raises questions about identity and the crossing of borders. Defying death for a final refuge "All our journeys, all our efforts will lead us to this point: the fence, which lets no one pass without making them bleed".

Fabrice Murgia, himself the son of a Spanish mother and an Italian father, is one of the best-known Belgian directors of his generation. He composes powerful images with circus performers, based on a score that tacks between jazz and baroque styles. Singers, musicians, and acrobats give a voice to those whom the fences have silenced and made bleed. A gripping, epic tale.

Laurent Gaudé in the role of librettist with Daral Shaga, "a circus opera for three singers, three musicians and five acrobats", whose music was designed by Kris Defoort. Around a symbol that is more contemporary than ever - the wall - Feria Musica, Laurent Gaudé, Kris Defoort, Fabrice Murgia and Vocaal Lab are inspired by the shreds of life left in Melilla, Tijuana or Lampedusa, to give life to Nadra and her father. Two journeys, two progressive losses of identity, two confinements, between hope and disillusionment, dream and reality.

The circus has its own means to express effort, new beginnings, self-confidence to reinvent every day. And Laurent Gaudé likes to draw the figure of a god of immigrants who allows us to glimpse the possibility of crossing from one bank to the other, gently. So, music and song can give space to abused bodies and let questions hover: beyond the border, what remains of the soul, of memory? Are they like identity papers and fingerprints? Burned, erased in pain so that we don't know where to send them, to the point of doubting their own origins, or even their own existence.

They therefore chose to write Daral Shaga's utopia with several hands. Because our cities are full of exiled gazes to appease, because the circus, an art of extreme obstinacy, benefits from continuing its incursions into new territories, because bringing together authors, composers, directors, acrobats, singers, musicians, gives them the audacity to move forward.

Direction: Fabrice Murgia (Director), Philippe de Coen (Artistic Director), Kris Defoort (Music Director)
Cast: Philippe de Coen, Bruno Renson (Set design), Michaela Riener, Maciej Straburzynski, Tiemo Wang (Singers), Chœur Ensemble Silbersee (Chorus), Emily Brassier (Lighting Designer)