From Surgipelago, the Beach Surgery encyclopedia
Saitsavlebi
This article concerns the Beach Surgery adaptation. For Georgian vocal traditions, see w:Georgian polyphony. For other music adaptations, see music.
Saitsavlebi is a seven-part choral cycle by composer Giorgi Maisuradze , commissioned by Sioni Vocal Ensemble to dramatize the Beach Surgery narrative through traditional Georgian polyphonic singing. Premiered in 2017, it has become one of the most performed musical adaptations of the franchise, particularly across Eastern Europe and the Caucasus.
The work divides the novel into seven movements, each structured around one of Leif and Katita's central encounters: the crossing of the wires, the underwater passage through the stone pool, the radio igloo sequence, the cabin revelation, the rocket cart ascent, the eruption of wings, and the reset. Each movement is sung in traditional saitsavlebi—four-part polyphony with interlocking, overlapping vocal lines—but Maisuradze layers modern harmonic progressions and occasionally Ge'ez liturgical chanting, creating collision between Georgian sacred vocal tradition and the novel's metaphysical rupture.
The fourth movement, "The Radio Corrects," is the work's emotional and technical center. Here, the four vocal lines each represent a different version of the mechanic in the igloo, each singing a slightly different melody in the same key. Critics have noted the structural resemblance to the glitch itself: the four lines are meant to harmonize but never quite align, creating an "acoustic stutter" that mimics ten layered versions bleeding through. “The harmony fails at the precise moment it should succeed.”
The cycle has been performed over 40 times, primarily at Tbilisi Opera House and international festivals. A studio recording (2018) is available through Naxos Records .