Concert/Performance: Sinopia

This two-part evening is the product of a collaboration between composer/organist Francesco Filidei, musician Chris Heenan and dancer/choreographer Hans-Werner Klohe. Francesco Filidei will open the evening with a performance of works by J.S.Bach; the Sinopia/Danse Macabre improvisation taking center stage during the principal section.

The performance is inspired by the fresco Trionfo della morte in Pisa’s Camposanto. The fresco is stripped of all color, leaving only the cartoon, the “image’s skeleton”, the sinopia. This coring or disrobing simultaneously constitutes the rudiments of improvisation, with music stripped of sound, and dance robbed of its somatic elements.

Chris Heenan (*1969) is an improvisational musician living in Los Angeles. He plays the alto saxophone, bass clarinet, contrabass clarinet and analogue synthesizer. Most recent projects include Phantom Limb & Bison with Jaime Fennelly, Chris Forsyth and Shawn Hansen and a duo with Berlin percussionist and light artist Michael Vorfeld. Chris Heenan resumes his Akademie fellowship in 2006.

Francesco Filidei (*1973) studied organ and composition at the Florence academy of music and at the Conservatoire Supérieure in Paris, in addition to computer music at the IRCAM in Paris. He took up the post of organist in the Chapelle de la Médaille Miraculeuse, Paris, in 2003. His compositions have been performed by the AlterEgo, Intercontemporain, Itineraire, Cairn, NEM, EOC and Klangforum ensembles, among others. Francesco Filidei has been an Akademie fellow since October 2005.

Hans-Werner Klohe (*1970) studied dance and choreography at the Heinz-Bosl-Stiftung in Munich. As a dancer, he has worked with the likes of Introdans (the Netherlands), Adventures in Motion Pictures/AMP (London, New York), Joachim Schlömer and Sasha Waltz. He has received the danceWEB (Vienna) and SiWiC (Zurich) prizes. Klohe, who produces his own pieces in Berlin, has been a fellow at the Akademie since October 2005.