Luciano Berio: Dramaturgy and open work

Abstract

The concept of “open work”, as described by Umberto Eco, owes its existence to collaborations
with Luciano Berio, among others during the conception of Opera, from 1956.
The openness, in Opera, consists among others in the multiplicity of meanings and in the
complexity of internal and external references, in the “integration of numerous levels of
perception”. Passaggio, premiered in 1963, realises the Brechtian principle of the abolition
of the border between scene and audience. It is a “musical action” in which the auditor
has a share. However, freeing itself from any narrative coherence, the musical and
dramatic space elaborated by Berio appears to unveil but an introspective openness, as if
to restore hearing’s primordial function.