Download HEINER GOEBBELS INDUSTRY AND IDLENESS

HEINER GOEBBELS INDUSTRY AND IDLENESS
A scenic concert with the Collegium Novum Zürich directed by Andrea Molino and Heiner Goebbels – a project
developed in co-operation between the Collegium Novum Zürich and the Schauspielhaus Zurich.
The concept
The aim has been to set up a scenic concert of around 70 minutes duration, unifying the four multimedia elements,
music, space, video and light, to create a form of artistic expression. The title Industry and Idleness refers to a
composition for ensemble by Heiner Goebbels, which was itself influenced by copperplate engravings by William
Hogarth. Furthermore, it underlines the aesthetic tensions in his work. These can be experienced directly from his
repeated presentation of contrasts, starting with a confrontation and then arriving at a balance: between text and
music, noise and tunefulness, between the use of a sampler and the virtuosity of the instrumentalists, between the
functional, mechanical nature of the urban, industrial environment und the liberty of thought and action of the
individual, etc.
Heiner Goebbels, in his drive for both separation and unification of acoustic and optical aspects has, for his scenic
concerts, has repeatedly abandoned conventional concert forms and rituals and moved towards a new type of musical
performance (Der Mann im Fahrstuhl 1987, Die Befreiung des Prometheus 1993, Eislermaterial 1998, ...meme soir.-,
2000 und Songs of Wars I have seen 2007). He is not trying to illustrate the music with projections, but rather to
define and use the concert hall as a space for artistic experiences, in which the boundaries between fiction and reality,
hearing and seeing, stillness and motion and between the performer and the audience are continually in provocative
states of change.
In Industry and Idleness the room, the walls, the requisites, the instruments and the musicians all become illuminated
surfaces, on to which the urban landscapes of the concert venue are projected in order to combine with the
composer’s work and render the musical structure transparent. The production and direction of the piece offer the
audience many routes of access to the music and many alternative views, so that everyone can make their own
experience without having pre-digested images and interpretations imposed upon them.
The basic production concept for the first performance will be developed and adapted in an artistic sense for the
specific locality, without losing from view the necessity for the concept to be transportable. The Schiffbau in Zurich, a
former shipbuilding hall in the city’s industrial zone, is an ideal site. It is used now by the Schauspielhaus Zürich as an
additional playhouse and an alternative to the main theatre at Pfauen in the town centre.
Collegium Novum Zürich Hallwylstrasse 31 CH-8004 ZÜRICH
T: +41 (0)44 251 60 44 F: +41 (0)44 291 60 44 [email protected] www.cnz.ch