Dec 11, 2008

And You Kept Us Awake With Wolves' Teeth

The Knife is writing an opera. Oh my! Since irony is dead (thanks Barack!), I'm glad to hear a healthy appreciation for magical creepiness is alive and well in the world.




From Hotel Pro Forma:

CONCEPT - "Tomorrow, In a Year" - A Darwin Opera
"Time forms our lives, gives our existence meaning and populates the globe. Generations, eons and millions of years create the new and eradicate existences. Nature selects, invites, dares everything without limitations.

In November 2009, it is 150 years since Charles Darwin published The Origin of Species. Our view of the world has been changed forever as a result of the theory of evolution. Tomorrow, in a year uses Darwin’s way of observing and describing the world. Change as a process and the interrelationship of all things is the basic material of the performance. Darwin claimed that evolution is not linear but moves in curves, in leaps. Tomorrow, in a year points to evolution as a field of possibilities, where nature unfolds its great liberality, finding niches and new paths. A performance of evolution and change, of transformation and mutation.

Tomorrow, in a year is an opera. The Swedish music group The Knife creates completely new compositions that challenge the conception of opera. The form is experimental and exploratory. The music is written for three singers who come from different backgrounds: electronica pop, classical opera and performance. They are structure, sensation, form, time and thought. They are the spokesman, the organiser, and the one who acts.

The Japanese choreographer and dancer Hiroaki Umeda creates the choreography for six dancers of different ages and physiognomies with a background in classical or modern dance. They are organisms, raw material, bodies that enter into various contexts. They are main and secondary characters in a changing process."

According to The Knife's website, Olof Dreijer (the male half, with sister Karin, that make up the duo), is currently making, "field recording(s) in the Amazon (of) animals, fish and plants."

Photo by Vincent Koglund.

This sounds amazing. Jacqueline, I hope your praying mantis- Heartbeats move is incorporated into this. Man, I would love to be a part of any of this... the costumes! the sets! the make-up/masks...! Can you imagine. It is set to open September 2009 in Copenhagen. Hm, maybe I need to do some networking and get to Copenhagen post haste after Estonian Adventure in June. Hotel Pro Forma sounds pretty rad on its own, as well. They did a musical production about Hans Christian Andersen in 2005, called "I Only Appear To Be Dead," among other ambitiously wonderful sounding projects.


Photo by Elin Berge.

Two related videos by my brother, Sam Lipp:
Bakcheia, only available on his website, and Xylem Phloem, on YouTube.

1 comment:

samuellipp said...

did you know that sister of the knife has a side project called Fever Ray. they only have one song though. check it aught