Nenia (2025)

Live opname door Klara tijdens de creatie op het Klarafestival in Flagey, Brussel (23/03/2025)

Met:
Ensemble Revue Blanche: Lore Binon, sopraan; Caroline Peeters, (bas)fluit; Kris Hellemans, altviool; Anouk Sturtewagen, harp
Audio, stem, tekst: Katharina Smets
Video: Lise Bruyneel
Dramaturgie: Katherina Lindekens
Technische ondersteuning: Jannes Dierynck, Brecht Beuselinck
Compositie: Frederik Neyrinck
Kostuums: RE Antwerp
Boventiteling: Liesbet Termont 
Audiomix: Wederik De Backer  
Outside eye: Jurgen Delnaet 

Coproductie:
LOD, Klarafestival, CC De Factorij, Flagey
Met de steun van de Vlaamse Gemeenschap

Meer info: www.revueblanche.be

Met dank aan Klara voor de opname

Nenia Fragment 3 (Act 3)

Nenia Fragment 1 (Act 2)

Nenia Fragment 4 (Act 4)

Nenia Fragment 2 (Act 2)

Sunflower Suite for sextet (2003)
live recording — Earplay, Mary Chun, conductor
13 March 2005, San Francisco, California

—————
Sunflower Suite (2003)

Prologue: Nature rarer uses yellow
I. A Fifth of a Miracle
II. riverbank sunset Frisco tincan vision 
III. Pile the bananas on planks.
IV. ¡Girasol de Fuego!
V. Weary of Time

Sunflower Suite takes Van Gogh’s ‘canvas all in yellow,’ his still life of fifteen sunflowers in London’s National Gallery, as a starting point for exploring the spectrum of shades of character associated with the color yellow: bright, loud, stark, bold, vibrant, irreverent, capricious, revelatory, blinding, redemptive... The image of the sunflower recurs throughout, refracted and transformed through the eyes of ‘visionary’ poets such as Dickinson, Ginsberg, Lorca, and Blake.

Imagine the prologue as a painter sifting through a bag of paints, considering various colors (the fragments of unrelated music that emerge from interspersed noise) before ultimately settling on yellow with the explosion that opens ‘A Fifth of a Miracle.’ The clarinet delivers the manic ‘sermon’ of Allen Ginsberg’s ‘Sunflower Sutra’ in the second movement, where a four note chord (D-E-B-C#), analagous to the dead sunflower that triggers Ginsberg’s revelation, is progressively invigorated until the movement’s frenetic climax.

‘Pile the bananas on planks’ is Wallace Stevens’ rallying cry for raw, unmediated expression in American art; a mocking waltz is interrupted by irreverent, quasi-tropical interjections and a bass clarinet cadenza. A mischievous piccolo paints blossom patterns in fireworks in the dancing ‘¡Girasol de Fuego!’, while a muted cello sings a yearning wordless setting of William Blake’s transcendental ‘Ah, Sunflower!’ to close the suite.

Sunflower Suite was written for the Philharmonia Orchestra’s Music of Today series and was premiered in the summer of 2003, the sesquicentennial of Van Gogh’s birth, by members of the Philharmonia Orchestra on June 19th at London’s Royal Festival Hall and repeated June 20th at the National Gallery.

Sunflower Suite

Written for Sarah Saviet and Joe Houston
Premiered at Eclat Festival 2025


album for the young (2024-2025)

Brodeck (2021-2023) 
Opera in two parts after Le rapport de Brodeck by Philippe Claudel

Recorded live at Opera Antwerpen

Damien Pass (Brodeck)
Elisa Soster (Emélia)
Helena Rasker (Fédorine)
Werner Van Mechelen (Orschwir)
Thomas Blondelle (Göbbler/Peiper)
Kris Belligh (Schloss)
Tijl Faveyts (Ulli/Buller)
Josse De Pauw (Anderer)

Chorus, children’s chorus and orchestra of OperaBallet Vlaanderen conducted by Marit Strindlund
Jan Schweiger & Hendrik Derolez (chorus masters)

Staging by Fabrice Murgia
Photo by Annemie Augustijns (OBV)

Recorded by VRT

0'30": Introduction
4'10": Scène 12 (Göbbler, Brodeck, Chorus, Children's chorus, Orschwir, Anderer)
9'52": Scène 13 (Brodeck, Göbbler)
13'52": Scène 14 (Tutti)
21'05": Scène 15 (Buller, Oschwir)
26'30": Scène 16 (Chorus, Emélia, Fédorine)
28'00": Scène 17 (Diodème enregistré, Children's Chorus, Emélia)
34'12": Scène 18 (Anderer, Brodeck, later Fédorine, Woman's Chorus)
47'00": Scène 19 (Anderer, Orschwir, Brodeck)
52'38": Scène 20 (Orschwir, Anderer)
55'47": Scène 21 (Emélia, Anderer, Fédorine, Brodeck)
59'14": Scène 22 (Orschwir, Brodeck, Chorus)

Brodeck (2021-2023) - Part 2

Brodeck (2021-2023)

Opera in two parts after Le rapport de Brodeck by Philippe Claudel

Recorded live at Opera Antwerpen

Damien Pass (Brodeck)
Elisa Soster (Emélia)
Helena Rasker (Fédorine)
Werner Van Mechelen (Orschwir)
Thomas Blondelle (Göbbler/Peiper) 
Kris Beligh (Schloss)
Tijl Faveyts (Ulli/Buller)
Josse De Pauw (Anderer)

Chorus, children's chorus and orchestra of OperaBallet Vlaanderen conducted by Marit Strindlund
Jan Schweiger & Hendrik Derolez (chorus masters)

Staging by Fabrice Murgia

Recorded by VRT
Photo by Annemie Augustijns (OBV)

0'29: Introduction
2'50": Scène 1 (Oschwir, Brodeck, Schloss)
7'12": Scène 2 (Emélia, Fédorine, Brodeck)
12': Scène 3 (Chorus)
14'35": Scène 4 (Brodeck, later Göbbler)
20'18": Scène 5 (Brodeck, Orschwir)
27'40": Scène 6 (Chorus, later Göbbler)
31'09": Scène 7 (Anderer, Brodeck)
33'07": Scène 8 (Chorus, Göbbler, Schloss) 
35'48": Scène 9 (Chorus & Children's chorus, later Peiper - Brodeck)
47'30": Scène 10 (Brodeck - Schloss)
54'11": Scène 11 (Emélia, Ulli, Brodeck, Chorus, Children's chorus

Brodeck (2021-2023) - Part 1

trace was written for a dance project of Karin Post's (Take) in 1994. The concept of the piece was based on the early computer drawings of Peter Struyken (who also created the lighting-design for the project), where simple algorithmic rules govern the direction of a line. The basic structure of the four parts of the music is simply a progression of complexity from the ratio 1:2 - 2:3 - 3:4 to 4:5. These proportions are worked out on a rhythmic and structural level.

Trace by Yannis Kyriakides (1994)

Àphones (2011), for 17 musicians
Orchestre du Conservatoire de Paris
conducted by Tito Ceccherini

Clara Iannotta "Àphones" (2011), for 17 musicians

New Orleans -> Harvard -> London -> Paris -> Istanbul -> New York City -> Rome -> Los Angeles -> Palermo -> New Orleans

Sunflower Suite

Christopher Trapani

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