An Archive of Love

More than any generation before us, we are preoccupied with love. Is not it after all the most individual of all emotions? And are not our love stories, like we ourselves, utterly unique?

Imagine we are wrong. And love is not that personal at all, but the most common and universal of all emotions. The characters and the scenery change, but the narrative of love is as old as mankind itself. The Great and Ruinous lovers of old tales have shaped our subconscious image of Romantic Love. Their stories form a huge Archive, a Collective Consciousness of human love, containing all love songs ever written. Claudio Monteverdi hunted Amor down in his  Madrigali Guerrieri and Amorosi , Claude Vivier tried to grasp the essence of Eros in his  Love Songs , whereas José Sanchez-Verdu focusses on Thanatos in his Scriptura Antigua .

In Annelies Van Parys' song cycle Ah, cette Fable an angel is trapped by his mortal lover: if it stays on earth, it will die, if it takes wing, its lover will not survive. As this little tragedy unfolds, the Archive starts to resonate with it. Words, sounds, and feelings, trigger associations and memories of previous passions, both sacred and profane. Echoes and fragments of other, older love songs, interrupt it and complement it, thus pushing the story into new directions.

Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart
soprano: Johanna Zimmer
soprano: Susanne Leitz-Lorey
mezzosopraan: Truike van der Poel
tenor: Martin Nagy
bariton: Guillermo Anzorena
bas: Andreas Fischer

composition: Annelies Van Parys, José Sanchez-Verdu, Claude Vivier, Claudio Monteverdi a.o.
arrangements: Annelies Van Parys
concept en dramaturgy: Gaea Schoeters
direction: Gable Roelofsen & Romy Roelofsen (Het Geluid Maastricht)
set design: Davy Van Gerven
production: Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart, Concertgebouw Brugge, Het Geluid Maastricht, Musica Sacra, Theater aan het Vrijthof