fluchten for 6 dancers and live-electronics

Photographs from childhood, showing trips into the forest, were the starting point of the work. The pictures collected in an album yellow as time goes by, leaving only a shadow of memory in the end. This process of losing is the basic structural element of fluchten, meaning fleeing in English. Beginning with a common memory, individual structures become more and more obvious, underlined by the increase of various live-electronic treatments.
fluchten focuses on spectral and spatial behaviour in an interactive environment. In this composition the music is directly controlled by position and energy of movement of the dancers, who are video-tracked by two infrared cameras. For example, parameters of granular synthesis like grain size, transposition and density or the ambisonic sound distribution of prerecorded sound files depend on where the dancers are situated and how they move. The prerecorded soundfiles are fragments of Franz Liszt`s work Waldesrauschen for piano and sounds of various traditional Maori instruments (taonga puoro) from New Zealand like putorino (flute/trumpet), purerehua (bullroarer), hue puru wai (water imitating dried fruit), mirimiri (stones) or roria (jaw`s harp). Combining different cultural concepts, European and Polynesian, the composition creates an intercultural dialogue about memories and nature, about perception and identity. Special thanks to Richard Nunns , Ngawara Gordon and Horomona Horo for their support with taonga puoro, the traditional Maori instruments.

fluchten, a commission of Kunstfest Weimar, was realized in collaboration with Chris Ziegler (installation), Steffen Fuchs (choreography) and Martin Bellardi (light programming).

fluchten - watch excerpt / Ausschnitt anschauen

Taonga puoro: Putorino, Porotiti and Purerehua, carved by Brian Flintoff, New Zealand