Anna S. Thorvaldsdottir
Archora
Leo Dick
Hofmann in Death Valley de
Olivier Messiaen
Et exspecto resurectionem mortuorum
Raphael Clamer & Johannes Werner, SPEAKERS
Titus Engel, CONDUCTOR
Basel Sinfonietta
The renowned French philosopher Michel Foucault is the subject of some peculiar anecdotes. His LSD trip to Death Valley in California became legendary: One weekend in 1975, he accepted an invitation from assistant professor Simeon Wade. It has been clear for some time, however, that this is no legend. What's more, this LSD trip had a lasting effect on Foucault's life and way of thinking.
In «Hofmann in Death Valley», Swiss author Leo Dick draws upon this LSD trip. Why Hofmann? Because Albert Hofmann experimented with the substance in Basel beginning in 1938 and discovered its hallucinogenic effects in 1943 - during a legendary self-experiment. It went down in history as «Bicycle Day». While en route to his home on a bicycle, accompanied by his assistant, the full effect of the substance was unleashed. Dick incorporates the kaleidoscopic play of colours and shapes described by Hofmann into his music. Anna Thorvaldsdottir and Olivier Messiaen similarly embrace expanded perception with unprecedented explosive force. When creating music, the Icelander frequently creates drawings to capture soundscapes, as in «Archora» from 2022. The title alludes to the Greek terms for «primordial being» and «space». It is an energy of primordial origin that Thorvaldsdottir unfurls into space in many forms and colours – floating and mysterious.
Messiaen also possessed an inherent synaesthetic perception of sound, colour and rhythm. The French grand master of modernism concurrently subjects these elements to an inexhaustible process of transformation. In «Et exspecto resurrectionem mortuorum», a work from 1964/65, the blown-up worlds are to be taken literally: The work commemorates the fallen soldiers of both world wars.
de German premiere
Program subject to change
