Magnificat

Ballet chorégraphié par Heinz Spoerli, sur la musique composée par Jean Sébastien Bach.

Retransmission en direct en Live HD sur la chaîne MEZZO, le 9 février 2012 à 20h00

WÄRE HEUTE MORGEN UND GESTERN JETZT

Si aujourd’hui était demain et hier aujourd’hui

Forme : Ballet chorégraphié par Heinz Spoerli
Créé à l’opéra de Zürich le 25 Avril 2009

Durée : 70 minutes sans entracte

Scène : Opernhaus Zürich

Dates :9 février à 20h00

Compositeur : Johann Sebastian Bach

Direction musicale : Marc Minkowski

Chorégraphie : Heinz Spoerli
Décors : Peter Schmidt
Lumières : Martin Gebhardt

PRESSE GERMANOPHONE

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung of April 27, 2009
Embodiment of the spirit

From the music: Heinz Spoerli’s Zurich Bach ballet
Zurich, April 26

No choreographer can ultimately avoid Johann Sebastian Bach. All creators in the field of dance theatre have admired, used, needed and even misused or exploited his music: John Neumeier and Hans van Manen, Bernd Schindowski and Pina Bausch, William Forsythe and Martin Schläpfer, Reinhild Hoffmann and Rosamund Gilmore. The reasons for such adaptations are easily found, since they are embedded in the structure of the music and the greatness of its composer. Bach’s faultless rules of harmony determine the proportions of dance, while his polyphony shapes the sequence of steps. What is more, Bach’s music is a wonderful vehicle for anyone’s art. Even less-than-perfect reproductions still allow the grandeur of the art to shine through and the adapter to bathe in the reflected glory.

Heinz Spoerli, who has been Ballet Director at the Opera House in Zurich since 1996, and only last month was awarded the German Dance Prize, has frequently choreographed to the music of Bach in the past, with spectacular results, such as the Six Suites for Solo Cello and the Goldberg Variations. His new work, ” Wäre heute morgen und gestern jetzt” (if today were tomorrow and yesterday today) for his Zurich Ballet company, however, is an even more demanding assignment than usual. That is because the Magnificat, which forms the second section of this evening of ballet set entirely to music by J.S. Bach, is not simply ornamental music.
Mary’s twelve-movement song of praise to the Lord on being chosen to bear the Son of God is an integral part of the vespers, or evensong. Consequently, a purely literal portrayal of the content is not suitable, nor is an interpretation of the meaning possible without the context of the text. So how do you go about dancing a liturgical hymn of praise?

Spoerli does precisely what all the great interpreters of Bach have done down the ages: he embodies the spirit of the music, instead of letting the notes do the dancing. The varying numbers of parts, the colourfully nuanced dancers and the sequence of keys in this highly musical textual interpretation correspond with the greatest degree of precision in the ensembles, pas de deux and various different groups of dancers on the sparsely furnished stage set designed by the Hamburg-based designer Peter Schmidt.

Spoerli appears to also have internalised the principle of opposing musical structure and the “doctrine of affections” of the Baroque era. In the costumes at least, both the secular and sacred spheres are evoked through the use of serious black and then light and bright blueish tones and in the juxtaposition of the implied stations of the Cross and human emotional outbursts.

All of this would not have achieved such success had he not had at his disposal a ballet company which is undoubtedly one of the outstanding ensembles in Europe. Furthermore, the Zurich Opera’s Baroque ensemble La Scintilla under the firm leadership of Marc Minkowski and a fine chorus of singers add to the high quality of the performance.

WOLFGANG SANDNER

Traduction vers l’anglais : Janet & Michael Berridge

liens : www.opernhaus.ch, www.spoerli.ch