When the Commendatore suddenly rises from his bier in the mortuary, Leporello recoils violently. He smacks painfully against the back wall, as if struck by a gust of hurricane-force wind. This cartoonish image is just one of many hilarious moments in Don Giovanni by the Nederlandse Reisopera. This production was performed after its premiere Saturday 4 March in the...
Misschien is God dood, maar Zijn kerk leeft. In elk geval in Denemarken. Dat heeft te maken met wat je de Deense geloofsparadox zou kunnen noemen: een sterk geseculariseerde samenleving met een Lutherse Folkekirke (=Volkskerk) die door een grote meerderheid van de bevolking wordt gesteund [hints]De Amerikaanse socioloog Phil Zuckerman heeft over dit aspect van Denemarken (en ook een beetje…
In de nieuwe Amsterdamse sociëteit Sexyland werd gisteravond een prelaunch georganiseerd van het Opera Forward Festival OFF [hints]Van 18 tot en met 31 maart in onder andere De Nationale Opera (voorheen het Muziektheater/Stopera)[/hints]. Ik was onder de indruk. Best verrassend. Opera Nopera Disclaimer: steller dezes is geen operaconnaisseur. De laatste twee opera’s die ik zag waren beide van Philip Glass (de ware…
Why did I find the mythical stories about being an artist more interesting than the artworks I saw? I wondered this after visiting the exhibition GOED GEMAAKT (ode to the making process) at the Amersfoort art gallery KAdE. Only a single work of art touched me, while the stories about Daedelus, Pygmalion and the daughter of Butades fascinated me immensely....
He was belatedly gripped by poetry, but how: for Flemish poet and street musician Geert Viaene (1963), poetry has now become a condition of life. 'A chord has been struck that still can't stop vibrating.' From this late bloomer, who published on digital forum Het Gezeefde Gedicht (The Sifted Poem), the debut collection Eistijden was recently published. Viaene understands the art of being outspoken in...
I read the biography of Jacob Israel De Haan, Onrust, by Jan Fontijn. Writer and director Gerardjan Rijnders based Salaam Jerusalem on this biography. It is this play, performed by De Nieuw Amsterdam, that really makes me realise how urgent it is to let such an almost forgotten figure as De Haan speak. Jacob Israel De Haan overturned taboos, fought...
Mijn vader stierf in 1997. Hij kwam uit een gezin met tien kinderen, waarvan er vijf inmiddels zijn overleden. Mijn tante Minke schreef daar een boek over: Broederziel alleen? Het boek maakte veel emoties los en kende in korte tijd acht herdrukken. Het verdriet om een overleden broer of zus bleek vergeten rouw. In het Engels worden de rouwenden forgotten…
Writer Jente Posthuma (1974) and photographer Bas Uterwijk (1968) teamed up to create a booklet about the carefully planned suicide of Uterwijk's father, Henk. Try to think a little good of me is an intimate, searching, resigned and at times hilarious portrait of a loved one who has fallen away. Bas and I met on the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu mat sometime in 2005. We were trying to...
'Unleashing war is the best way to escape from yourself,' we read on the gauze screen in front of the Stopera stage. Then the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra begins Alexander Borodin's Prince Igor. A catchy one-liner, but it raises expectations that are not met. Musically, too, this co-production of De Nationale Opera and the New...
On Friday 10 February in Utrecht, the Nederlands Kamerkoor will kick off its concert series Sacred and Profane, based on Benjamin Britten's choral work of the same name. The programme also includes his popular cycle Hymn to St Cecilia, which he composed during World War II. The score was confiscated by the US Customs Service in 1942 because it allegedly contained codes that were dangerous to the state. The American fear of a...
Pauline Slot debuted very successfully in 1999 with the novel Zuiderkruis, this book became the best-selling debut that year. Death of a Thriller is her seventh novel. She also writes non-fiction and teaches creative writing. The narrator in Death of a thriller writer Selma Hoogstins is an author and writing coach. She welcomes in the summer at her paradise estate...
Actress and cabaret performer Yora Rienstra (35) knows at first hand what depression can do to a person's life: her grandmother was manic-depressive. That is why she agreed when she was asked to perform in the solo show PAAZ, even though after seven years of cabaret she did not want to be on stage alone again. 'But I found Myrthe van der Meer's book...
His two internationally successful novels Oorlog en terpentijn (War and turpentine) and De bekeerlinge (The convert) take Stefan Hertmans around the world. But the social side of life it clashes with his desire for solitude. Six life questions to Flemish author Stefan Hertmans. 'When I am alone, I find myself.' 1. What is your recurring dream? 'For fifty years, I have had to...
In The Hague, they think it's a waste of money. Let them. Here are seven performances that were more than worth 'that sin'. Mona, Ariadne, Mariken, but also breathtaking circus theatre, a secret marriage, genre-transcending satire and the greatest set ever. Mona, NTJong (youth theatre/drama) 1. It is the biggest pitfall of the age indication in theatre performances. Put 6+ and you...
Five art experiences will always stick to this bizarre year for me. And one thing really scared me. Whether the worst is now behind us? At least the most extraordinary is still on view until 5 February 2017. A chronological overview of what was unbelievable, unthinkable, inconceivable, unbelievable and perhaps untrue. Much of it, by the way, will be in 2017...
Bij de verkiezing van beste film 2016 door de Nederlandse filmpers eindigden La La Land en Toni Erdmann op een gedeelde eerste plaats. Tonio is de Nederlandse favoriet.
Two of the finest stories in world literature have recently been reissued. The Dead (1914) by James Joyce and The Clerk Bartleby (1853) by Herman Melville have effortlessly stood the test of time. They are still wonderful reads. 'His soul slowly ebbed away as he heard it gently snowing through the universe and gently snowing in the...
You instinctively flee from death, but in 'Have I been here before' choreographer Marie Goeminne actually brings death close. Not threatening, but close to your skin and hand in hand with life. She shows death and life in an intimate entanglement. Three dancers merge in a stream, concentrated and vulnerable, in which life arises,...
Meer dan 120 miljoen boeken verkocht bestsellerschrijver Wilbur Smith – tweeduizend Wembley-stadions vol. Zijn vaste recept – geweld, magie, mysterie, avontuur, jagen en seks – houdt zijn lezerspubliek al meer dan een halve eeuw geboeid. Om zijn productie hoog te houden, werkt hij sinds kort met coauteurs. Alleen de ‘Egypte-romans’, waartoe ook zijn nieuwe boek Farao behoort, schrijft hij zelf.…
The public takes no part in the ongoing debate about the role of art in society. Government and art-makers argue or engage constructively with each other. Visitors' opinions are not sought. Hence this contribution. Of course, my voice is just one of thousands. I can only give my own opinion. Last week, I attended the play...
As a boy, I loved visiting the Egyptian department of the National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden. Half in the twilight, the mysterious mummy coffins there stared at me. We are now several decades and exhibits further on. Since this week, the newest Egypt display has been open. Even in brilliant light, the collection appears to retain its fascinating power. At the same time, the museum tells in Queens...
With Austerlitz, Sergei Loznitsa made a documentary about tourists in former concnetration camps that was as rigorous as it was unsettling. This year, he is guest of honour at IDFA and gave a master class there.
Meg Stuart's two-hour heroic epic Until Our Hearts Stop, showing at the Rotterdam Schouwburg this week, does not engage in dramatic construction according to the rules of Aristotle's Poetics. We don't know who those people are there on stage. Nor do they seem to have been given any special assignment, although they are clearly being...
‘Ik heb er 18 jaar over gedaan om een nieuwe opname te maken’, zegt de Kroatische pianist Ivo Pogorelich (1958) met een bescheiden glimlach. ‘Net zoveel tijd als een baby nodig heeft om meerderjarig te worden.’ Het is woensdag 2 november. Een bijzonder moment, want die dag gaat Pogorelichs cd-loze nieuwe opname van Beethovens Pianosonate’s nr. 22 en nr. 24…
Om maar meteen met de deur in huis te vallen: de nieuwe productie van het oratorium Jephta van Händel bij De Nationale Opera is prachtig. Decors, kostuums, enscenering en uitvoering: allemaal top. Na afloop van de première woensdag 9 november kregen uitvoerders en productieteam dan ook een welverdiende ovatie van een uitverkochte Stopera. Het is geen sinecure de geringe dramatische…
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