I saw the new opera Ice by Jaakko Kuusisto yesterday. The librettist Juhani Koivisto says it was "a story that wanted to become an opera," but I would rather have said that it was "a story that never could become an opera;" I was really astonished when I first heard of the plan to turn Ulla-Lena Lundberg's novel into an opera. And as it was, I never felt I was watching an opera, but rather a musical with concert music. Still, the story of a clergyman moving to a small island with his family on his first job and ending with him drowning accidentally is interesting, and it was an altogether nice experience with realistic sets and post WW2 costumes. The music was unremarkable but it made a suitable background for the smaller and greater events in the archipelago.

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Another aspect of "ice" was the way to the opera and back on slushy, wet and partly icy streets. I took the risk of wearing my evening boots with high heels, and I got finally home safe and sound after a couple of wobbly patches - unlike the clergyman of the opera, whose risk-taking ends fatally.