Opera Philly Presents Premiere of “The Listeners”

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“How do you murder a sound?” is the question sung by one of the characters in “The Listeners,” a new opera that receives its U.S. premiere this week with the Philadelphia Opera at the Academy of Music.

The character, a teenager named Kyle, is part of a small suburban group in an unidentified American city that is tormented by a sound of unknown origin. It is a constant humming noise—for Kyle it is a truck “roaring to hell,” while another character says it is “an electric drill slamming into my brain,” from which there is no respite. The sound tortures them, destroying their mental stability.

Composer Missy Mazzoli, a Lansdale, Pennsylvania, native who now lives in New York, based the hum on real-life mysterious sounds. Intrusive, persistent hums with no discernible source have been reported in places like Taos, New Mexico; Auckland, New Zealand; and Windsor, Ontario. An online data map tracks reports of the hum.

“My favorite Wikipedia page is the list of unexplained sounds, if you want to go down that rabbit hole with me,” Mazzoli said. “I started listening to some of those recordings online and then I created my own operatic version.”

Mazzoli composed “The Listeners” for traditional orchestral instrumentation, except for the drone. To mimic the uncanny experience of being a Listener, at key moments the orchestra stops and an electronic drone emerges from speakers installed in the academy.

“We created a surround-sound system in the theater,” Mazzoli said. “No matter where you sit—back in the balcony or in the front row—you feel the sound swirling around you, as if it were coming from inside your head.”