Johann Sebastian Bach’s Six Sonatas for Violin and Harpsichord (BWV 1014–1019) prepare the ground and form the driving kinetic force of sinnestaumel. Bach’s artful interweaving of three equal voices gives rise to constantly emerging and evolving forms in real time—demanding both analytical precision and playful artistry from the interpreters.
Accepting the challenge of the music, the dancers place their physicality in dynamic interplay with one another and with the evocative lines of the music. They follow the energy of Bach’s sonatas—at times in harmony, at times in contradiction—continually shifting roles and relationships with each other and with the musicians, who in turn anticipate, accompany, or intentionally oppose the dancers. Compositional lines unfold and intertwine, running in parallel or building contrapuntal tension. Along the richness of Bach’s musical architecture, a continuum of ever-shifting associations and appearances emerges—something perpetually in the making, non-narrative, yet vital, evocative, at once unsettling and captivating.
The spatial dimensions, the performers, and the musical voices composed by Bach form the three artfully interwoven “voices” of sinnestaumel. Before the audience’s eyes and ears, they converge into a vibrant dance performance that opens associative spaces in endless, vortex-like variations—suggesting moods and characters, and oscillating between hope, longing, melancholy, joie de vivre, and reverie. These continuous shifts between presence and absence, between being and non-being, remain in constant becoming. Lyricism and drama, humor and the grotesque merge to illuminate the poetic force of human expression through dance and music.
- Concept, Artistic Direction: laborgras
- Artistic Collaboration: Barbara Weigel
- Choreography: laborgras in collaboration with the dancers Abraham Iglesias Rodriguez & Tian Gao
- Dance: Abraham Iglesias Rodriguez, Renate Graziadei, Djamila Polo
- Violin: Midori Seiler
- Harpsichord: Christian Rieger
- Dramaturgy: Arthur Stäldi
- Costumes: Claudia Janitschek
- Lighting Design: Raquel Rosildete
- Lighting supervision: Luigi Kovacs
- Artistic Production: Micaela Trigo, Urszula Heuwinkel
- Press and Public Relations: Yven Augustin / Augustin PR (Berlin), Marcelo Vilela da Silva (Bregenz/AT)
- Social Media: Marcelo Vilela da Silva
- Photography: Phil Dera
- Design: Mia Sedding
- Music: Johann Sebastian Bach – Six Sonatas for Violin and Harpsichord, BWV 1014–1019, including Sonatas BWV 1014, 1017 & 1019
About Laborgras: https://www.laborgras.com/