By Sciarrino’s own admission, this is the best and reference version of his well-known 2-act-opera Luci mie traditrici, in a stunning performance by Ensemble Algoritmo, conducted by Marco Angius.

Luci mie traditrici was presented on 19th May 1998 in the Schwetzinger Festpiele under the German title Die tödliche Blume (The Deadly Flower). The libretto by Sciarrino is based freely on "Il tradimento per l’onore", a prose tragedy published for the first time in 1659 under the name of G A Cicognini (Florence 1606-Venice 1649) and followed by various reprintings.

The libretto centres on lovers’ basic conflicts, but Luci reaches beyond the ordinary by showing how familiar impulses can spiral into the pathological and cause disaster. A timid person turns into a perfidious murderer when he loses the certainty of his relationship. Tender feelings mutate into obsession; boundless love becomes immeasurable suffering; and the dream of lovers’ paradise turns into a vision of eternal damnation.