Years
2019 2018
Quartet For The End Of Time
2018-10-25

Quartet For The End Of Time

By Olivier Messiaen (1908 – 1992)

25 October 2018

Odeion

19:30

“THE IDEA OF THE END OF TIME AS THE END OF PAST AND FUTURE AND THE BEGINNING OF ETERNITY”

Anmari van der Westhuizen and Samson Diamond (members of the renowned Odeion String Quartet), will join with the award-winning soloists Grethe Nöthling and Danrè Strydom to perform one of the 20th century’s most compelling chamber music works, Olivier Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time. These musicians need no introduction to Bloemfontein audiences.

Composed while he was a prisoner of war, Messiaen's Quartet has continually wowed audiences since its creation. The oppressive conditions within which the work was conceived - set against the backdrop of wartime conditions in Nazi Germany - contribute to the work’s inner narrative. In this unsettling time of global political and social uncertainty, we aim to reframe this work from the past in order to contemplate the present. Music woven together with other art forms elicit and explain a range of emotions where words often fail.

A selection of striking WWII photos will be projected behind the musicians - reflecting the theme and history of the composition.

About the composition
Olivier Messiaen (1908 - 92)
Quatour pour le fin du temps (1940 - 41)

Olivier Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time was written in perhaps the most incongruous spot any great score has been composed in: an unheated barrack in Stalag VIII-A, a German prisoner-of-war camp, during the second winter of World War 2. Messiaen wrote this mystical quartet for the instruments available in the camp (clarinet, violin, cello, and piano) in a setting that is arguably among the least conducive for creative work.

The quartet is Messiaen's musical depiction of and rumination on Revelation 10:1-7, which the composer included as a heading to the score:

“I saw a mighty angel descending from heaven, clad in mist, having around his head a rainbow. His face was like the sun, his feet like pillars of fire. He placed his right foot on the sea, his left on the earth, and standing thus on the sea and the earth, he lifted his hand toward heaven and swore by Him who liveth forever and ever, saying: "There shall be time no longer, but at the day of the trumpet of the seventh angel the mystery of God shall be consummated."

ADMISSION

  • R120 (adults)
  • *R80 (pensioners)
  • *R70 (UFS staff)
  • *R50 (students, learners and block bookings of 10+)

Tickets available at Computicket or online at http://online.computicket.com/web/

*Please note that tickets for pensioners, students, learners and UFS staff can only be purchased at a Computicket outlet (Shoprite Checkers) or at the doors since a valid card or ID has to be presented to qualify for the above-mentioned discount.

ENQUIRIES
Ninette Pretorius (tel. 051 401 2504)


Back
My plaas se naam is Vergenoeg

Director: Pieter venter

Writer:  George Weideman
Venue: Wynand Mouton Theatre

Dates & times:

14 May at 19:30

15 May at 19:30

16 May at 19:30

17 May at 19:30

R 30.00 per person & R 20.00 per person (students, scholars & pensioners)

Bookings:   Computicket (Mimosa Mall en Checkers) 

“My plaas se naam is Vergenoeg”, written by George Weideman was the winner of the Sanlam Theatre price for best script for Afrikaans theatre.  This play is more than a classic farm story.  The multi- layered, storie is situated in Namakwaland, during the time of commission sittings. Grace Boois wants to bury her son on the farm Vergenoeg, but who own the farm?  Were the Bushmans there first or the animals?  The Bushmans used rocks to indicate that the land belongs to them, and the farmer bought the land.

A Greek chorus or in this case the animals comment about the happenings on and off the stage.  Tsoei-Goab’s son/daughter, together with the all-knowing narrators, the jesters and morphing characters join the animals to create magical realism on stage.

Comments by the actors on the play suggest that it is different, epic and extraordinary, but still relevant to issues that must be addressed today.  The play hint towards Pieter Fourie’s “Die Koggelaars”.

The production, which promise to be an epic visual experience, will play at the Wynand Mouton Theatre from 14 – 17 May at 19:30. Pieter Venter is the director and the players are third year students from the department of Drama and Theatre Arts at the University of the Free State.

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