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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
Sterkstroom

Name of production: Sterkstroom

Script by:  The Company

Director: Gerben Kamper

Venue:  Scaena Theatre, UFS Main Campus

Language:  Afrikaans

 

Dates and times:

12 August 2015                   18h00

13 August 2015                   20h00

14 August 2015                   19h30

 

Prices:  R 40.00 for adults / R 30.00 for students, scholars / R25.00 for pensioners.

Bookings:   Computicket (0861 915 8000)

 

Press Release

 

Sterkstroom (the name of a small town in the Eastern Cape directly translated as Strong Stream) is a devised theatre production that showcases the acting and script writing talents of the honours students at the department of Drama and Theatre Arts of the University of the Free State. This production also serves as this year group’s primary practice based training module.

 

Sterkstroom presents the audience with the complex narrative of eight, interlinked characters that reconnect after 15 years at their high school reunion. The play investigates issues such as violence, sexuality and racial tensions. Characters include a former rugby player, a successful business woman, a medical rep., the wife of a dominee, a professional dancer, a lesbian and a doctor. Together, they share a secret: a secret which, after 15 years of silence, is laid bare. Each character’s story is based on a real-life event taken from contemporary South African newspapers and magazines, but changed to only highlight societal issues and not to function as a vehicle for these individual testimonials that might be recognizable to the audience.

 

Under the expert direction of Gerben Kamper, senior lecturer in Drama and Theatre Arts, the production acts as microcosm for the South African theatre industry, and as practice in transition with students taking on the roles of actors, writers, technicians, marketers and designers. 

Sterkstroom can be seen at the Scaena Theatre on the UFS campus on the 12th of August at 18:00, on the 13th of August at 20:00 and on the 14th of August at 19:30.  Tickets are available through Computicket. The production carries an age restriction of 14.

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