Unearthing Melodies

»Einfach Mal Singen« is the name of a chorus from Gummersbach whose members are people with and without dementia. Valerij Lisac stages an encounter at eye level, a mix of live performance and video installation, including the unusual amateur ensemble and the professionals of the Asasello Quartet. How do the chorus members react to contemporary music? What impulses can they offer the string quartet? And how do composers treat the subjects of memory and loss of memory? Alfred Schnittke is one example: in his String Quartet No. 3, he incorporated quotations ranging from Orlando di Lasso to Shostakovich – fragments of musical works which shaped his own artistic identity and also evoke multiple memories and associations in listeners. Another example is Peter Ruzicka: his Quartet No. 4 »… sich verlierend«, which also includes spoken texts on the subject, resembles a guided tour of the composer’s musical memory – remarkably, here even the process of losing this memory is expressed in music.

Gefördert vom Ministerium für Kultur und Wissenschaft des Landes Nordrhein-Westfalen, vom Kompetenzzentrum für Kulturelle Bildung im Alter (kubia) und vom NRW KULTURsekretariat