2020 marks the year that the Royal Opera's percussionist Roger Svedberg doubles as a writer. Earlier this year, he released with the decoy Carmen syndrome. Now he is up to date. In the distance you hear a sound, a book that directs the light to what Svedberg described as the orchestral ditch's "darkest corner": the percussionist.

- There are a lot of mysteries and oddities that I have researched around and tried to find out. And it became more and more an obsession to find out what it is I really do. That's why I wrote the book, he tells Culture News.

The sound effects drive the action

The sound effects have a central dramaturgical significance for the action, explains Roger Svedberg. Because it is precisely the sound effects that drive the action forward.

- A sound effect, if done correctly, becomes like a poetic story that in itself gives as many associations as everything else. As in Puccini's Tosca where everyone in the last act waits for the clock to hit four, because then the execution will take place. Doesn't hit four o'clock, yes, then the whole action stops, he says.

"Requires steel nerves"

As a percussionist, you must also be able to play a variety of instruments. From the slightly ridiculous and unassuming triangle, to the most noisy plays in the orchestra dike. But sometimes it will be a bit of a wait before it's time to hit their cannon or cymbals.

- It is a very strange feeling to be both bored and stressed at the same time. You always have to know where in the opera you are and how long you have left, be prepared for a long time, and then it says "thug!" And that's it, Roger Svedberg says:

- It requires steel nerves.