Madrigal of Sorrows (2026)
from Luminosity: The Passions of Marie Curie
for bass-baritone and electronics
8 minutes
Commission/Premiere Info: Commissioned and premiered by Nicholas Isherwood with video by Quintan Ana Wikswo.
Program Notes
A Madrigal of Sorrow
Charles Baudelaire
What do I care though you be wise?
Be sad, be beautiful; your tears
But add one more charm to your eyes,
As streams to valleys where they rise;
And fairer every flower appears
After the storm. I love you most
When joy has fled your brow downcast;
When your heart is in horror lost,
And o’er your present like a ghost
Floats the dark shadow of the past.
I love you when the teardrop flows,
Hot as blood, from your large eye;
When I would hush you to repose
Your heavy pain breaks forth and grows
Into a loud and tortured cry.
Madrigal of Sorrow is from Luminosity: The Passions of Marie Curie my multimedia opera that delves into themes of discovery, spiritualism, and the quest for the invisible. Through projected images and videos by Quintan Ana Wikswo, the opera explores the life and groundbreaking achievements of Nobel Prize-winning chemist Marie Curie. It chronicles her early 20th-century quest to overcome the darkness of disease through the discovery of radium and radioactivity—an achievement that ultimately led to her own tragic demise due to prolonged exposure to radiation.
Madrigal of Sorrow is from the opera’s Séance Scene, where Pierre Curie engages in a séance to engage in questions of life beyond death. The electronics in this piece reference my earlier work, Pierre’s Dissertation on Crystals, premiered by Nicholas Isherwood, incorporating sounds of piezoelectricity from crystals, ominous Geiger counters, and excerpts from my string quartet A Prayer for the Year of the Insane and The Fire Sermon with HEX Ensemble.
As the séance scene unfolds, Pierre becomes increasingly unhinged, envisioning Marie mourning his death. His descent is expressed through his singing of Baudelaire’s Madrigal of Sorrow, accompanied by a recording of my aria Polonium, performed by Tony Arnold (soprano) and Thomas Rosenkranz (pianist). This work captures the profound emotional and intellectual struggles of Marie and Pierre Curie, intertwining themes of discovery, loss, and the human pursuit of the unknown.
Purchase
To purchase the scores and parts, email Pamela Madsen via the Contact Form.
Performances
November 19, 2026 | Nicholas Isherwood, Goldsmiths, University of London, UK
November 7, 2026 | Nicholas Isherwood, FontanaMIX at Giardini Margherita, Bologna, Italy
October 2, 2026 | Nicholas Isherwood, Center for New Music and Audio Technology, UC Berkeley, CA
June 27, 2026 | Nicholas Isherwood, BİLGİ Yeni Müzik Festivali, Istanbul, Turkey
May 26, 2026 | Nicholas Isherwood, Unerhörte Musik, Berlin, Germany
April 7, 2026 | Nicholas Isherwood, CSUF