La Folle Battaglia - The Crazy Battle
Category: Performance | Role: Performer | Venues: Theaterdiscounter Berlin, Lichthof Theater Hamburg
La folle battaglia is a music theater piece that shows a fight between the principal musical elements. I was enacting the harmonic side and, in addition, assisting with coordination and outreach. The following text was written by me as a press announcement:
Music is an everyday phenomenon. But unlike the many quarrels our current world is facing, this is a beautiful one. Yet even here, sparks often fly. Disguised as dissonances, two combative tones wage hostilities against each other, waiting to be replaced by sounds that get along better. Disguised as musical guardians of order, hard drumbeats break through delicate soundscapes with their military clatter. Arias, appearing as the conscience of music, cry out with their elegiac chains of notes for attention within the swamp of noises and sounds. The gigantic auditory experience that people undergo when receiving musical works is characterized by the constant trial of strength between the various components of the art of tones and sounds. One might almost think that what is going on there is comparable to the disputes in “real life.”
Nevertheless, we enjoy listening and relish the interplay of various musical subtleties just as much as the acoustic struggle over who or what sets the tone. Most of the time, however, this happens rather unconsciously. A project that brings precisely these rivalries to light is currently taking shape in Hanover. Under the direction of Marie-Luise Jauch, the Streicherakademie Hannover is developing a staged concert dedicated to the “battle of the musical elements.” In the project of the same name, the three main sources of musical conflict are embodied by actors. Melody (Eva Scharpenberg), Rhythm (Georg Luibl), and Harmony (Markus Posse) battle one another. A clash ensues somewhere between major and minor, but never without sound! The Streicherakademie’s intergenerational and interdisciplinary ensemble accompanies the whole with a repertoire ranging from Vivaldi to Gershwin. The musicians, young and old, thus provide the individual parties (not always) with the right arguments, but certainly enough material to discuss—and perhaps even “attack”? The highlight of the concert is a piece composed specifically for the project, in which all three quarrelsome elements get their comeuppance: La Folle Battaglia—the crazy battle. Whether understood as a metaphor or as a playful journey into the depths of musical functionality—with the “Battle of the Musical Elements,” the Streicherakademie brings a concert experience to the stage that can interest everyone: with a little action, plenty of wit, and, of course, an exciting range of music.
