We’ll Take the Liberty #1–#3
2020 – 2021
Dedicated to Ludwig van Beethoven – by Novoflot
Between opera and piano concert, music-theatrical exhibition and symphony, philharmonic exploration of space and newly composed music, Novoflot’s new trilogy is being created. A wide variety of instrumental ensembles, singers and performers will consistently think about further aspects of Ludwig van Beethoven’s idiosyncratic compositional practice and explore them scenically in extreme spatial arrangements. Beethoven’s curiosity about the contradictory serves as a decisive driving force here! We are so free #1 – #3 is a contemplation of 250 years of the most violent impact of a singular musical œuvre on contemporary art and the present of art.
#1 Fidelio
Premiere
14 March 2020
Large exhibition hall at the Akademie der Künste Berlin, Hanseatenweg
In the first part of the new trilogy, Novoflot makes Beethoven’s Fidelio
sound like an echo of a liberty opera. In an exhibition performance for
trumpet, sound installation, keys and voices, the achievements of the
French Revolution appear as long forgotten attributes in the midst of a
stele field of acoustic sources and artefacts.
The trumpet signal, once the salutary musicalized message of the
supposed happy end, is the cornerstone of an experimental arrangement
for the trumpeter Damir Bacikin, who, together with an ensemble of
performers in the white cube, explores the utopian potential of opera as
well as Beethoven’s musical-dramaturgical process of discovery. In the
process, the opera’s protagonists sound as voices from the beyond, which
the composer and pianist Antonis Anissegos transforms into a
kaleidoscope of sound, original music and new composition.
Variable duration, free access.
In co-production with Akademie der Künste Berlin by Labor Beethoven 2020 – Festival of contemporary music Musik for the Beethoven anniversary
With:
Antonis Anissegos
Damir Bacikin
Maxime Barbasetti
Konstantin Bez
Almut Kühne
Vicente Larrañaga
Renae Shadler
Ghost whisperers / Sound installation:
Rebecca von Lipinski, Narine Yeghiyan, Florian Hoffmann, Antony Shelley
Team:
Sven Holm Direction
Vicente Larrañaga Musical Direction
Antonis Anissegos Composition / Sound installation
Elisa Limberg Stage Design
Anne Storandt Co-Stage Design
Silvie Naunheim Costume Design
Mirko Borscht Video
Rafal Dziemidok Choreography
Sven Holm & Malte Ubenauf Concept
Ismael Schott Light Design & Technical Direction
Koray Alkan Sound Design
Dörte Wolter, Miriam Glöckler & Thorsten Cölle Production
Philine Reimer Assistant to the Director and the Film Director Luzi Madrid Villanueva Trainee to the Director Almuth Pfützenreuter Assistant to the Production Managers Franziska Englberger Assistant to the Costume Designer
#2 ∞ – Ma non troppo
World premiere:
12 October 2020
In front of the Kölner Philharmonie (Cologne Philharmonic Hall)
Berlin premiere:
1 and 2 July 2021
in front of the Admiralspalast, Berlin
Between the cathedral of Cologne and the Museum Ludwig, the roar of the railway tracks and the flow of people in everyday life, a piano concerto in the public space will be created above the underground Philharmonic Hall, on the forecourt of the Concert Hall. Patrik Baboumian, the strongest man in Germany, and the dancer Rafal Dziemidok, as Beethoven’s proxy and flashback, reflect their own work and recreate the composition cycle for the two pianists Antonis Anissegos and Joseph Houston into a fragmented ride through Beethoven’s piano works. Two walk-in cubes are loopholes for the audience, who are granted individual, exclusive and temporary access during the four-hour performance (corona-compliant).
With:
Antonis Anissegos Piano
Joseph Houston Piano
Patrik Baboumian Performer
Maxime Barbasetti Performer
Hayden Chisholm Saxophon/ Performer
Rafal Dziemidok Performer
Renae Shadler Performer
Team:
Sven Holm Director
Vicente Larrañaga Musical Director
Elisa Limberg Stage Design
Eleonora Pedretti Co-Stage Design
Silvie Naunheim, Lisa Fütterer Costume Design
Mirko Borscht Video
Ismael Schott Ligth design / technical direction
Koray Alkan Sound Design
Dörte Wolter, Miriam Glöckler, Sophie Beck, Teresa Reiber Production
Andrea Tortosa Assistant to the Director Ulla Winterschuh Stage Manager Franziska Englberger Assistant to the Costume Designer Bodo Herrmann, Sebastian Söllner Stage technic Benjamin Flehinghaus, Sotiris Papadopoulos Transport / Stage construction Falko Siewert Photos Hans Schauerte, Philip Kießling Documentation Heike Diehm k3 berlin Press and public relations
#3 The 10th Symphony
World premiere
14 October 2020
Kölner Philharmonie
Berlin premiere
1 and 2 July 2021, 8 PM
Admiralspalast, Friedrichstraße 101, Berlin
The 10th Symphony conceives Novoflot as a musical theater for the Cologne Philharmonic Hall, spanning a musical arc from Beethoven’s late string quartets to excerpts from op. 125, fragments of the 10th Symphony and world premiere compositions by Michael Wertmüller. In a tour of the foyers, floors and hall of the Cologne Philharmonic Hall, the Berlin Opera Company develops a scenic walk through the stage that resembles an exploration of the open structures of a work not yet completed. The 10th symphony is based on a libretto by the Berlin author Gesine Danckwart.
Singers:
Rebecca von Lipinski Sopran (Köln), Eva Resch Sopran (Berlin)
Sara Hershkowitz Sopran (Köln), Aki Hashimoto Sopran (Berlin)
Christina Daletska Mezzosoprano
Performers:
Patrik Baboumian
Maxime Barbasetti
Mirko Borscht
Rafal Dziemidok
Renae Shadler
Johnny La Marama:
Chris Dahlgren E-Bass
Kalle Kalima E-Guitar
Eric Schaefer Percussion
Ensemble of Nomads
Emilio Guim E-Guitar
Talvi Hunt Piano
Gäste:
Sofia Souldina Violin
Lucas Niggli Percussion
Sonar Quartett
Wojciech Garbowski 1st Violin
Susanne Zapf 2nd Violin
Nikolaus Schlierf Viola
Anna Carewe Violoncello (Cologne), Konstantin Manaev Violoncello (Berlin)
Stark Quartett (Cologne)
Nurit Stark 1st Violin
Yumi Onda 2nd Violin
Grégoire Simon Viola
Martin Smith Violoncello
Nomir Quartett (Berlin)
Daniella Strasfogel 1st Violin
Yumi Onda 2nd Violin
Yodfat Miron Viola
Martin Smith Violoncello
Hayden Chisholm Saxophon
Antonis Anissegos, Joseph Houston, Jacopo Salvatori Piano
Team:
Sven Holm Director
Vicente Larrañaga Musical Director
Michael Wertmüller Composition
Gesine Danckwart Libretto and texts
Elisa Limberg Stage Design
Eleonora Pedretti Co-Stage Design
Silvie Naunheim, Lisa Fütterer Costume Design and puppets
Mirko Borscht Video
Ismael Schott Light Design
Koray Alkan, Jonathan Bruns Sound Design
Dörte Wolter, Miriam Glöckler, Sophie Beck, Teresa Reiber Production
Jacopo Salvatori Assistant to the Musical Director Andrea Tortosa Assistant to the Director Ulla Winterschuh Stage Manager Franziska Englberger Assistant to the Costume Designer Bodo Herrmann, Sebastian Söllner Stage technic Benjamin Flehinghaus, Sotiris Papadopoulos Transport / Stage construction Falko Siewert Photos Hans Schauerte, Philip Kießling Documentation Heike Diehm k3 berlin Press and public relations
The 10th Symphony remix
With “The 10th Symphony remix”, the trilogy “We’ll take the liberty #1 – #3” by the Berlin-based opera company Novoflot on the occasion of 250 years of Beethoven comes to an end and at the same time announces its continuation into an – uncertain – future.
Premiere:
03 December 2021
At and in the House of Statistics, Karl-Marx-Allee 1, Berlin-Mitte
After the performances of the 10th symphony in the Cologne Philharmonic Hall and in the Admiralspalast, Novoflot are now continuing the project for the opening of further presentation options and are allowing it to return as a remix. Beyond the already established and in Corona times much practiced possibilities of streaming, a digital-analog hybrid format is created in our case, which links the digital recurrence of the source material with live moments of our performers.
Beginning with a video-audio-walk triggered by a smartphone app along the shop windows and through the urban canyons around the Haus der Statistik, the parcours leads the audience into the workshop of the late 1960s building complex vis-à-vis Alexanderplatz. Here, in a freely accessible installation, Mirko Borscht (video and performance), Eric Schaefer (drums) and Chris Dahlgren (bass) will overlay the compositional and textual source material by Michael Wertmüller and Gesine Danckwart in a live act, readjust it and subject it to a remix.
The 10th Symphony remix is designed as a permanently developing course of text, music, video, performance and situation of the venue, strictly choreographed and yet free and flexible in the respective execution; art production in times of the greatest possible global uncertainties.
With:
Mirko Borscht Video and performance
Chris Dahlgren E-Bass
Eric Schaefer Drums
Team:
Sven Holm Director & concept
Vicente Larrañaga Musical director
Michael Wertmüller Composition
Gesine Danckwart Libretto and texts
Mirko Borscht Video
Hans Schauerte / Souterrain Filmproduktion Camera/Documentation
Philip Kießling Video editing
Jonathan Bruns Sound Design
Floris de Groot Technical director and ligth design
Dörte Wolter Company Management
Sophie Beck Production management
Ana Cuellar Assistant to the Director k3 berlin Press and public relations TINA Agency Tour Management
