EIN LINDENTRAUM - UWE SCHOLZ' BALLET PERFORMANCE


Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Piano concert Es major KV 271

Robert Schumann: Symphony No. 2 C major op. 61

Steffi Scherzer & Oliver Matz

___ For the ballet of the Staatsoper Unter den Linden, Uwe Scholz has regrouped under the title 'Ein Lindentraum ...' two of his best choreographies for a double bill. Compositions by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Robert Schumann confront each other, as do the rigorous classical form and the extravagant urge to express oneself from the romantic era. This principle of confrontation is also present in the choreographic style of Uwe Scholz. The strict form of the classical ballet encounters a cold aesthetic of the body to acknowledge the profound human need to express one's own emotions. Uwe Scholz draws from the classical and academic movement vocabulary and, with his choreography, creates as a matter of course a whole language both artificial and natural. Through this, Scholz not only treats the music as a mere subject, but includes at the same time with a genius musicality its inner substance. ___

___ STAATSOPER BERLIN ___

Nicole Siepert & Nadja Saidakova

___ One listens with the eyes. One sees with the ears. ___

___ With his Piano Concerto Es-Dur KV 271, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart reaches in 1777 the highest point of his creativity within this genre. Pure action determines already the first phrases of his compositions. The orchestra and the piano beat upon each other immediately. From the very beginning, the event taking place determines the work. A work in which the instrumental characters take the shape of people - people which Mozart turns into real figures later in his opera. The composer wrote this work as a commission for a certain Mademoiselle Jeunehomme that he affectionately called »Jenomy«, and whose name bears the subtitle of the piano concerto. ___

___ Robert Schumann composed his Symphony Nr.2 C-Dur op. 61 in 1845 in a further attempt in his artistic work to restore a historical continuity. Rising from a deep inwardness, the romantic need to express oneself faces in this piece the objective principle of the classical symphony. Schumann succeeds to establish - particularly in the scherzo - a connection with these two principles. »In the same phrase he picks up in a romantic and fantastic manner the idea of the stylised dance«, as writes the music professor Attila Csampai. This is a pure piece of fantasy, following - via the detour of a poetic picture - a new path for dance, and for the romantic ballet scene: a romantic, enchanted ghost tied to the popular effect of perpetual motion of that time. ___

Nadja Saidakova

___ When Uwe Scholz was awarded the German Dance Award on March 6, 1999 in Essen, the Berlin critic Klaus Geitel described in his commemorative publication the pure incredible musicality of Uwe Scholz with these words: »Since the most advanced ballets of Balanchine there has been no more comparable counterpart between choreography and music, and it even appears from time to time that in this relationship Scholz has the gift to surpass himself, and outgrow the master.« Step by step the music appears to resound his work, to articulate itself nearly inevitably like that and not in any other way. While one may secretly hope that the choreography would in the best case mirror the music, Scholz dutifully translates it into visuals through an unparalleled artistic show of strength; and, vice versa, the music becomes a true reflection of the stage imagery as a rhythmical and symphonic picture. As Geitel says, »Scholz composes with steps. He composes with dance. His ballets write with classical steps - to the greatest possible extent - a silent speech on the dance floor: firmly anchored on the track for everyone's delight, for everyone's pain. This is what always makes his work turned towards novelty. One listens with the eyes. One sees with the ears.« ___

Ronald Savkovic

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