'Wagners music, the more you listen to it, the more you are captured by it, it is really like drugs, so to say.'
The Wesendonck-Lieder are seen as Wagners pre-study for the legendary opera Tristan und Isolde. The musical lyrics are based on the poems by Mathilde Wesendonck, Wagers muse and greatest forbidden love. This marvelous cycle of songs combined with a contemporary storyline arouses curiosity: Is the Romantic era still alive within us? And how?
Text fragment:
'And then I check your whatsapp
and see when you were online for the last time
and then I scroll up
and read, in reverse order
our seemingly endless, but finite dialogue
our ongoing conversation.'
Wesendonck-Lieder Heute is presented in the context of the Wagner Year 2013 and is a precursor of the Tristan und Isoldy by partner the Dutch National Touring Opera. Het Geluid Maastricht, winner of the Dioraphte Best of Amsterdam Fringe Award 2010, is also artist-in-residence at Theater aan het Vrijthof.
The show is a co-creation with the Dutch National Touring Opera. A co-production with Theater aan het Vrijthof and made possible with support by the Amsterdam Fringe Festival, Goethe-Institut Amsterdam, Amsterdam Art Fund and the Province of Limburg.
Music: Richard Wagner
Made by: Het Geluid Maastricht in collaboration with the Dutch National Touring Opera
Director: Gable Roelofsen and Romy Roelofsen
Soprano: Francis van Broekhuizen
Actor: Laila Claessen
Pianist: Femke de Graaf or Nathalie Doucet
Text: Mathilde Wesendonck and Gable Roelofsen