Name: 7 Lieder aus letzter Zeit
Start: 2024-05-22
End: 2024-05-22
Location: Theater Casino Zug

Organization

Conductor

Mathias Weibel

Stage director

Thom Luz

Costume designer

Tina Bleuler

Lighting designer

Jens Seiler

Sound designer

Martin Hofstetter

Singer

Mara Miribung

Soloist

Daniele Pintaudi

Samuel Streiff

Theater Casino Zug

German

7 Lieder aus letzter Zeit

Switzerland

Theatersaal

Public

Rückert-Lieder

Approved

Gustav Mahler’s «Songs after Rückert» are the starting point for the new musical theatre creation of Swiss theatrical artist Thom Luz and his ensemble of actors and musicians. As is the case with Mahler’s lieder, Luz’s musical theatre evening deals with the universe of decline, despondency, decay and the fatigue of the world – and yet they are never without hope. On the contrary, they are brimming with quiet humour and beautiful, magic images of the theatre. Or as the Berliner Theatertreffen described it recently: «Thom Luz is a master of the subtle difference, making his hazy evenings the equivalent of musical air mail. They somehow send their wonderful news with nothing, through nothing and to nothing – or at least nothing tangible. And that is his new, shimmering definition of comedy. The figures on his stage are experts in the strange, resistants to definitions, dissidents to reason and its machine of values made up of goods and figures. Their role model is the smoke machine since it creates images, atmospheres and magic, through which the sound of the music can penetrate without obstacle.»

Gustav Mahler’s setting to music of the texts of Friedrich Rückert (composed between 1899 and 1902) came about during the change in eras from late romantic to early modern, and are redolent of the melancholy and overburdening of the rapidly changing worlds as it went from one century to another. Given here the title «Lieder aus letzter Zeit», the compositions are not connected in terms of content but nevertheless united in a loose song cycle. «Letzte Zeit» here means «recent», but obviously it also resonates of the last days and the prevailing mood of fin de siècle. The title was chosen by Luz and his ensemble for their musical game of hide and seek since, as well as Mahler’s amazing and oblivious song compositions, it also features chansons, madrigals, canons and variety, all of which tell of our strange life between two eternities. They have been arranged for five voices, with radiators as instruments, hidden pianos and invisible strings, since attitudes to life are similar to how they were back then in Mahler’s music room, a good 120 years on:

«I have got lost from the world – in which I had already wasted much time – for so long, it has taken nothing from me – it may well believe that I am dead!»

English

7 Lieder aus letzter Zeit by Mahler, Wed 22 May 2024, From (2024/2024), Directed by Thom Luz,, Conductor Mathias Weibel, Theater Casino Zug, Zug, Switzerland

Performance credits (Cast & Crew )

Cast

Crew

Program, About & Synopsis

Photos

Further reading

Performance Dates & Venues

Venues