MELEA
Babylonian confusion of tongues? Enigma of time, born out of the spectre of the past? What does the wisdom of old people tell us nowadays? What do manuscripts that are thousands of years old say? Humanism today – in a globally networked world?
“ME<le>A” draws a bow of craving for communication, from the intellectual to the absurd, from the metaphysical to the banal. The things that were regarded as an entity in Ancient Greece (music, language and movement: mousikè téchne) are tried out and deciphered anew in “ME<le>A”. “ME<le>A” traces the cycle of the year, whereby song texts from the Ancient World in particular are assigned to the individual sections. Two themes determine this cycle: man’s relationship with the Ancient Gods and with the Christian God respectively, and love between men and women – the blossoming and disruption of eroticism.
Ancient Babylonian, Ancient Greek, Latin, Ancient Italian, Spanish, English and German are the languages of the occident. The arch stretches from a hymn to Ištar to poems by Archilochos and Sappho as far as C. Valerius Catullus, Q. Horatius, Carmina Burana and St. Francis of Assisi. The relationship between metre and rhythm, iso-metrics, various tone systems and real-time encounters between language, music and movement are only a few of the aspects that will be highlighted. A dynamism evolves in this project from meetings between generations and their various approaches to artistic work and science, which opens up spaces.
The Ensemble DITHYRAMBOS comprises teachers, alumni and pupils from the grammar school at Babenberger Ring in Wiener Neustadt.
The Ensemble LOGOS from the international harmony centre of the University of Music and Performing Arts uses interdisciplinary thought-provoking impulses and applied theory. Harmony homes in on the analysis of forms, on designing and planning, on art and experimentation; in this way it is different from exclusively theoretically spoken approaches.
“ME<le>A” is a cooperation between Greek-Latin-Choir DITHYRAMBOS (Wini Koppensteiner), Ensemble LOGOS (Werner Schulze) and Tanz Atelier Wien (Sebastian Prantl).
dancers: Florian Berger, Paola Picazo, Patric Redl, Manuel Wagner, Nanina Kotlowski, Sebastian Prantl
Greek-Latin-Choir DITHYRAMBOS: Marie-Theres Bauer, Evelyn Kraut, Anna Rehak, Lisa Rehak, Viola De Stefani, Dieter Gansterer, Wini Koppensteiner, Erich Neubauer, Werner Schulze
Ensemble LOGOS: Ulrike Sych (soprano), Johann Leutgeb (baritone), Johnson Vettoonickal (voice), Mehrdad Pakbaz (Ûd), Wilfried Satke (conductor, guitar), Adi Schober (percussion), Werner Schulze (bassoon & contra-bassoon), Hans Tschiritsch (Tschiritschophone/percussion), Ekrem Ilker Ülsezer (bandoneon)
compositions: Hildegard von Bingen, Mehrdad Pakbaz, Wilfried Satke, Werner Schulze, Hanns Stekel
coordination: Katrin Grubelnik, Stefan Astner
[Wiener Neustadt, St. Peter an der Sperr, October 2008]