O Mensch! – Composition Commission issued to Pascal Dusapin

CICT – Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord, Paris

After initial collaborations in 2006 and 2008 Pascal Dusapin had an increasing desire to create a cycle of songs for the baritone Georg Nigl. This desire took shape against the backdrop of the composer’s longstanding interest in the poems of Friedrich Nietzsche. With the support of the EvS Music Foundation a cycle then came into being consisting of 27 songs and four interludes for unaccompanied piano. O Mensch! will be premiered on a very simple stage split into two by a water (vapor) screen upon which ephemeral images of the singer will appear by means of projection. These moving images pass through the veil of mist making it possible to progress from one poem to the other. Little by little Dusapin’s Nietzsche takes shape. The close collaboration of the two artists gave rise not just to a work for Georg Nigl’s voice per se but rather for his singing corpus, for his voice upon the stage.

November 15^th to 20^th 2011 
Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord, Paris

January 10^th / 12^th 2012 
Grand Théâtre de Luxembourg

Further Information: 
www.bouffesdunord.com