DAS IMAGINÄRE NACH LACAN (THE IMAGINARY ACCORDING TO LACAN) (2016/2017)
for singer/performer, large orchestra, additional parts and live electronics
Text: Helga Utz (based on poems from the Arab world, primarily from the pre-Islamic and early Islamic period)
Composition, samples + live electronics: Iris ter Schiphorst
Programming and sound direction: Wolfgang Musil
Duration: 25 min.
Composition commissioned by Wien modern
WP: 04.11. 2017, Konzerthaus, Great Hall, ViennaSalome Kammer / Webern Symphonie Orchester / Orchestre du Conservatoire national supérieur de musique et de danse de / llan Volkov
Performance material available from Boosey & Hawkes
About the piece
The piece operates as a foil for our perception; in this 'experimental set-up', the soloist Salome Kammer embodies a woman in two roles: an Arab and a European. In the course of the piece, she switches back and forth between these two roles. Through sometimes literal repetitions of musical material - but 'embodied' in different roles - our perception comes into focus. Will the recipients interpret the same musical statement differently depending on whether they perceive a familiar or unfamiliar figure? And if so, how? What creates the images in our heads? Do we not always see through a veil and form our own image?
Helga Utz's text is based on poetry from the Arab world, primarily from the pre-Islamic and early Islamic period. The ancient Bedouin tribes attached great importance to poets, especially women poets, and many works have survived over the centuries that reflect on a high level. Famous female poets include Al Khansa from the 6th century, Rabia from Basra and Rabia-i Quzdari from the 10th century, and Shada Bint Ahmed ad-Dinoria, who died in 1178. They are always descriptions of a world out of joint, which can only be meaningfully confronted with uncompromising humanism.
I.t.S.
see also the following interview:
https://www.musicaustria.at/das-spiel-mit-der-wahrnehmung-fliesst-stark-in-diese-arbeit-mit-ein-iris-ter-schiphorst-im-mica-interview/
Libretto (text compilation by Helga Utz):
Die Zeit,
it left the unknown behind,
haunted us with the death of the
dreamers, whoarenow only corpses in
graves.
Day and night come and go,
but the people go out.
Lean with me
into the gentle breeze,
and rest between two
anemone blossoms!
Come, let us sit on the bed,
count the stars in the sky until morning dawns!
Come, let us climb the mountains:
Let us love or become black earth.
See how the world is upside down, how disturbed:
The wolves free, the shepherds are in chains!
Come to me,
for my breast is a bed of childhood.
Don't you see, the stars are shining,
and the eyes of men are closed.
And the rulers have closed their gates.
And here I am, alone with you.
And the rulers have closed their gates.
And all lovers are alone with their beloved.
And here I am, alone with you.
Buy pay money business people trading
buy money pay smoking business people
pay money buy smoking business people trading
with everybody with everything
pleased to meet you
yeah
english speaking people everywhere
trading everywhere
with everybody
with everything
Far, far
beyond right and wrong
lies a field,
a singing field,
there I will meet you.
I was like a footprint in the path of others,
ah,
wiped out by the tread, by the step of the feet ...
The autumn wind blows
and has scattered the spring,
the dear life went
- we have done nothing.
Hope's burden on your neck,
no work, nothing in your hand.
And heedlessness
did not departfrom your stained heart.
The crown of pride
thou wearest on thy head
and stridest, strutting,
and thy hem
drags over the carrion of the world.
Oh, if only instead of tomorrow
another day, and now -
the night in between would be eternal, so that everything
would have to rest.
Reviews
Wiener Zeitung, 06.11.2017, Lena Dražić
...The highlight of the evening was the work "Das Imaginäre nach Lacan" by the Vienna-based composer Iris ter Schiphorst. The singer Salome Kammer performed fragments from classical Arabic poems, presenting herself partly in Arabic and partly in European dress - a play on the images that arise in the mind when perceiving the foreign. Not only the scenic realisation, but also the music itself was able to build up dramatic tension - the electronically expanded orchestra created a sound image of unusual drasticness.
Online Merker, 04.11.2017, Karl Masek
...the highlight of the evening was the world premiere of "Das Imaginäre von Lacan" by German composer (and professor at the mdw) Iris ter Schiphorst for performer/voice, orchestra and live electronics (2017). Text: Helga Utz based on ancient Arabic poetry. In the city of Sigmund Freud, Jaques Lacan (1901-1981) aroused the interest of the Berlin-born composer as a kind of Freudian successor among psychoanalysts. In simple terms, the "I" (self-knowledge) of the human being develops in the study of mirrors. This is why the original working title was "Mirror". However, this was abandoned (those with experience know: And the "imaginary" (only taking place in the imagination) should be reflected in the poetic texts (surprisingly high proportion of women!).
Iris ter Schiphorst not only lends these texts musical inspiration, but also a high degree of emotional urgency. And in Salome Kammer, Schiphorst has an ideal interpreter of these 16 sequences. They are entitled "The wolves are free, the shepherds are in chains!" in the Wien Modern almanac. The unchanging texts are performed in different languages and in changing costumes (alternating between Western European and Muslim, including veils) with gripping intensity. Kammer is a multi-talented artist (a singer with a soft timbre and stratospheric high notes; an actress with a comparatively dark voice and great expressive power, especially in her dramatically heightened Sprechgesang, but also a cellist). The costume changes on the "open stage" are done with taste and without any artificiality. The "artistic experiment on the current ban on veiling" was fully appreciated - without any of the artificial excitement that can sometimes be found in everyday life. ... Well-deserved ovations for all involved!
Der Standard, 05.11.2017, Daniel Ender
"Claudio - Abbado concert": Sounds - veiled and unveiled
...The internationality of the audience was probably due to the last item on the programme, which was rather unorthodox for an orchestral concert of new music and opened up a wide field of associations: The world premiere of The Imaginary after Lacan by Iris ter Schiphorst, an experiment with visual and auditory perception based on Lacan's thesis that individuals only define themselves through their encounters with the "other", with the "foreign", was entirely in keeping with the festival motto "Images in the mind". Early Islamic texts To this end, librettist Helga Utz compiled poetic early Islamic texts by female poets, which the haunting and virtuoso soprano Salome Kammer sang alternately veiled in "Arabic" and then dressed in "European" clothes. The stylistic spectrum of the piece ranged from oriental-influenced cantilenas to extroverted patterns close to American popular music. As simple as this basic idea was, as vivid and simple the musical material was, the setting was effective - and the resulting images in the minds of many will probably linger for a long time.
Deutschlandfunk, Reinhard Kager
...You wouldn't expect a topical political statement under the motto "Pictures in your head". And certainly not from ancient Arabic texts spoken by Salome Kammer in a German translation. And yet the Dutch composer Iris ter Schiphorst succeeds in extracting something contemporary from the ancient scriptures. Halfway through her new orchestral piece "The Imaginary after Lacan", the soloist slips into the chador of an Arab woman to recite the same text again: Do the images we form of the interpreter possibly change our perception of the socio-critical content she conveys to us?