Ipsa Dixit

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Ipsa Dixit is a chamber opera for voice, flute, violin and percussion by US composer-performer Kate Soper. It premiered in New York in 2016, performed by Soper herself and the Wet Ink Ensemble. The piece was nominated for the Pulitzer prize in music in 2017, and dubbed as a 21st century masterpiece by music critic Alex Ross who wrote for the New Yorker - “a ninety-minute tour de force in which ideas assume sound and form. Call it philosophy-opera.” Ipsa dixit means “she herself said” and is a play on the phrase “Ipse dixit” - he himself said, which denotes the logical fallacy of accepting a statement “just because” and without references and reason - just because he said it. Soper playfully asks questions on the enigmatic and treacherous limits of ideas, expression and language while answering them in the same instance. She puts to work texts and text fragments from various authors; poets, philosophers, musicologists, visual artists and playwrights and transforms them into what she herself says. The first part of the opera will be premiered in Iceland as part of Reykjavik Opera Days in November 2024.