nspired by musical sources from the Mediterranean, Sonia Wieder-Atherton has conceived of a musical event for solo cello, string quartet, double bass, zarb and cymballum, featuring three new works by Georges Aperghis, Pascal Dusapin and Ivan Fedele, and including works by Albeniz, Monteverdi, Granados.

	Sonia Wieder-Atherton		cello
	Françoise Rivalland		zarb, cymballum, santur and daf
	Quatuor Parisii		string quartet
	Pierre Feyler		doublebass
Thierry Coduys : sound conception and coordination Alexis Coussement : lighting
Sonia Wieder-Atherton and Bruno Fontaine musical arrangements
Approximate duration : 1H30 without intermission
Coproduction Festival d'Aix-en-Provence, Arsenal de Metz, Festival Musica de Strasbourg, Festival de Marseille Production representative : Instant Pluriel, Olivier Mantei Distribution for France : Namaste, Sandrine Maricot
Création : 19 juillet 2001 Marseille -21 juillet 2001 Aix en Provence Reprises : 17 décembre 2002 à Poitiers - 28 janvier 2003 à Amiens

"duende" (the "right stuff" in musical parlance)

Manuel Torres, great andalousian artist, would say to a singer : "You have quite a voice, you mastered the styles, but you'll never succeed : you have no duende".
Le Lebrijano, wonderful singer used to proclaim : "On the days I sing with duende, I fear no one".
Duende is to be found in any art, but it obviously is best exploited in music, danse and spoken poetry, since those arts require a living body as their means of expression, and since those arts forever die and rise again, the present being their exact time.

Federico Garcia Lorca, La Havane,1930.

What do the most recent premieres of Dusapin, Aperghis, Fedele and traditional Egyptian, Turkish or Byzantine chants have in common with works by Monteverdi and Granados? For most of us, nothing at all. But for Sonia Wieder-Atherton, everything. Or almost…
“For a long time now, I have wanted to uncover the musical sources and resources of one of the richest and most hybrid civilizations in the world. A place where Persian, Turkish or Arabic words intermingle in an Ottoman chant, there where Egyptian accents are rolled in a Greek song…
My goal is to combine musical moments having the intensity of a psalmody about the story of Joseph and his brothers sung by a hazan in a Mosque in Cairo with a lamento sung by a mendiant in Naples…
The three composers I have asked to write a new work for this occasion have found their inspiration in these same sources, all while integrating them in their respective musical realms. Works by composers such as Monteverdi, Albeniz or Granados as well as popular songs from the Mediterranean, arranged for solo or accompanied cello, are organized around these three, new, highly personal compositions.
It is not my aim to provide a comprehensive guide to the Mediterranean, not to give a history of Mediterranean music, but rather for one kind of music to attract and shed light on another; and for the worlds of the past to impart their treasures to the world of the present, so that their voices may continue to be heard.”

Sonia Wieder-Atherton.

ALEPPO to SEVILLA
the program


Egyptian chant, for solo cello (traditional/arr. SWA and BF)
Turkish chant, for solo cello (traditional/arr. SWA and BF)
Georges Aperghis Profils (new work), for cello and zarb
Around an Algerian nouba, for cello, string quartet and daf (traditional/arr. SWA and BF)
Pascal Dusapin Imago I (new work), for solo cello
Claudio Monteverdi Mentre vaga Angioletta, for two cellos and double bass (arr.SWA)
Pascal Dusapin Imago II (new work), for solo cello
Ivan Fedele Levante (new work), for cello, string quintet and cymballum
Improvisation, for zarb
Enrique Granados Intermezzo, for cello and string quintet (arr. I.Duha)
Pascal Dusapin Imago III (new work), for cello
Syrian chant, for cello, string quartet and santur (traditional/arr. SWA and BF)

Profils commissionned by the Festival Aix en Provence
Imago commissioned by the Arsenal/ Metz
Levante commissioned by the Festival Musica /Strasbourg

SWA = Sonia Wieder-Atherton
B.F = Bruno Fontaine