San Clemente - Les Jardins Musicaux - Cernier CH
August 28 2021 - 5 pm
Grange aux Concerts
Alda Merini / Pierre Jodlowski
An island in the bay of Venice, inaccessible : San Clemente. Psychiatric hospital exclusively dedicated to women before transforming into a luxury hotel, the building which occupies the major part of the island, is the main inspiration of Pierre Jodlowski’s last multimedia show. Written for a singer-actress, accordion, piano/keyboard and clarinet, this project reveals an ambiguous place, a palimpsest enclosing a century of isolation and madness. The same madness is sublimated by the libretto, based on Alda Merini’s third poetry collection La Terra Santa , where the nightmare of the asylum (Merini spent many long years in the hospitals) coexists alongside a erce outburst of life and love addressed to the «other».
commissioned by : Maryse Fuhrmann for the Festival Les Jardins Musicaux - Cernier (Switzerland)
coproduction : Festival Les Jardins Musicaux / éole, studio de création musicale
concept, composition, lights and video : Pierre Jodlowski
scenography : Claire Saint-Blancat
soprano : Clara Meloni
percussion : Jean Geoffroy
live electronics : Pierre Jodlowski
