Der Sommer in Stuttgart

LIES of CIVILIZATION
Four music theater miniatures

Malte Giesen: white border
for three male voices, three instruments and electronics ^WP

Yiran Zhao: THE SINGLE DAY*
for mezzo-soprano. three instruments, video and electronics ^WP

libretto: N. Andrew Walsh

Øyvind Mæland: Part of the Job
for four voices, clarinet and percussion ^WP

Natalia Domínguez Rangel: The Invisible
for tenor, bass, percussion, synthesizer and electronics ^WP

Production/Lighting: Gable [&] Romy Roelofsen/Het Geluid Maastricht
Set design: Davy van Gerven

Neue Vocalsolisten

Truike van der Poel, mezzo-soprano/Martin Nagy, tenor/

Guillermo Anzorena, baritone/Andreas Fischer, bass

Members of Ensemble PHACE, Vienna
Mathilde Hoursiangou, keyboards/sampler
Reinhold Brunner, clarinets
Berndt Thurner, percussion

The international co-production LIES of CIVILIZATION interrogates from four compositional perspectives the myth of civilization that has become deeply inscribed in the value systems of Western-oriented cultures. At the center of attention are questions about the current situation of global civil societies: Yiran Zhao subjects this finding to a witty as well as laconic questioning of how certain we can be of our interpretation of the world. Natalia Domínguez Rangel, following in the footsteps of Michel Foucault, ponders the closely interwoven structure of knowledge and power. Øyvind Mæland illuminates the fatal connection between ever more prosperous economic forms and the simultaneously growing loss of personal freedom. Finally, Malte Giesen deals with the phenomenon of framing and comments on the changes and manipulations of perception in a digitalized and medially processed world. His music theater is both a reflex and a critique of »today’s ubiquitous social media and selfie self-representation culture.«