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Music
Music – Louis Armstrong believed good music saves rhythms well. Sartre added the thought that Jazz and especially the Blues is universal music because it touches upon human pain. What distinguished Louis Armstrong from many other musicians and artists, is that he would never forget those who work in the kitchen while up front the folk which can pay for the dinner plates allow themselves to be entertained. He also said there are things 'you 'don't learn at school'. He differs from musicians and composers who only play for the upper class for the sake of fame and the money which goes with that kind of recognition.
The philosopher Th.W. Adorno reflected music as he was himself a composer. He did a lot to support Schönberg, the composer of the twelve tone, but they were only friends until Adorno advised Thomas Mann on how to describe him when referring to Leverkühn, a figure in Mann's novel 'Dr. Faustus' and who ends up selling his soul to the devil.
Europe has adopted Beethoven's symphony dedicated to friends being like the stars in the night sky always there. That is no coincidence. Beethoven was one of the few who would stand up to Napolean and not bow down just because the niece of the emperor was passing by.
There is the European orchestra and other attempts to facilitate cross-border learning and mobility of musicians. Magnolia Albertazzi combines, for instance, cultural heritage with promotion of opera in former castles and palaces, while Valencia has tried to initiate a day of opera throughout Europe.
In Malta, the former artistic director Marshall wanted for 2018 to have build a concert hall, so that the orchestras he knows could come to Valletta and have a proper place to play their music.
To remind, Kant said music, indeed sound comes the closest to the memory track. When listening to music, the mind expands in space. There are tunes which remind of the universe, but also like the wailing guitar of what it means to live in dense urban centres.
2014
Thursday 6th Nov
Hide & Seek
13:00 // Concert Hall in Umea, Sweden
Of interest is that HIDE & SEEK is a music performance with songs and texts about identity. Lately, and ever since focus has been on linking music and theatre (e.g. Mario Frendo in Malta with his studies of Grotowski), this development of music in relation to performance can be interpreted as a search for a new method to identify people who they are. It is done in a dramatised form of musical scenes.
The music is played by the vocal string quartet STRÅF and produced in collaboration with the director Svante Grogarn.
HIDE & SEEK has been touring as of late throughout Sweden.
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