Eher wässrig - St. Johannis, Brandenburg a.d. Havel 26.9.2020
A project by Anne and Martin Müller.
Eva Beneke - guitar, recitation
Anne Müller - performance, flute
Martin Müller - talk
Music
Choral: Wie soll ich Dich empfangen BWV 249 - J.S. Bach
Chaconne D-minor, BWV 1004 - J.S. Bach
(Arranged for guitar and performed by Eva Beneke)
Improvisation - Anne Müller
Texts
Versuch über die wahre Art das Clavier zu spielen - Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (Berlin, 1753)
Versuch einer Anweisung die Flöte traversière zu spielen - Johann Joachim Quantz (Berlin 1752)
Die fünf Trauerphasen - The five stages of grief
Liste der Kinder der Bach-Famillie - A list of children of the Bach family
Time to share this video of an intimate and personal (yet public) performance that took place in Brandenburg in the middle of the Corona pandemic. From my perspective, it proves even more meaningful to share this video with you here three and a half years later. It is always special to perform with artist friends I have known for a long time. In the case of Anne Müller, the musical encounters go back to our years together in a Latin-pop/jazz combo we started as teenagers in Berlin, and way back to us playing the classical repertoire on flute and guitar as school kids.
Anne has a strong and defined artistic voice and huge portfolio as a visual artist, performance artist and more recently as a musician as well. Here is a link to our most recent encounter in my Berlin kitchen, where I add experimental sounds to one of her stunning pop tunes.
This performance from 2020 is meaningful to me on so many levels. It starts out with paraphrasing and humming Bach´s famous choral melody “Wie soll ich Dich empfangen?”, included in cantata No. 5 of his Weihnachtsoratorium. A melody of hope, grief, despair, resurrection and expectation all at once.
Reading out loud the famous text where C.Ph. E. Bach speaks about performance from his angle, describing Affekt. (“Indem ein Musickus nicht anders rühren kann, es sei dann selbst gerührt”…Vom Vortrage, p.122).
The other text is a treaties by Johann Joachim Quantz on talents and character traits required - in his opinion - of a musician. The chapter is called: Von den Eigenschaften, die von einem, der sich der Musik widmen will, erfordert werden. You can read it here on google books.
Then, later, I perform the Bach Chaconne in sections, interrupted by reciting the psychological “stages of grief” a person experiences when losing a loved one. The video shows an edit of the first part only.
Anne is frozen in a performance of water and unspeakable things for the longest time. She later goes on to improvise on the flute, while I start naming all of Bach´s children, including those who died at childbirth or during infancy. The invitation to perform together came from Anne a few months after the passing of my dad, and you hear it in my voice at times. The entire concept only started making sense to me after the performance, also reflecting on the feedback I got from those who watched it. It is true that occasionally art takes on a form where Affekt allows the artist to “live through” and experience the process in entirely different ways. Maybe more profound than I ever could have imagined. As C.Ph.E. Bach puts it:
“Indem der Musickus nicht anders rühren kan, er sey dann selbst gerührt; so muß er nothwendig sich selbst in alle Affeckten setzen können, welche er bey seinen Zuhörern erregen will; er giebt ihnen seine Empfindungen zu verstehen und bewegt sie solchergestallt am besten zur Mit=Empfindung. Bey matten und traurigen Stellen wird er matt und traurig. Man sieht und hört es ihm an.”
Let me know what you thought of it.
Warmly, Eva
photos by Stefan Maria Rother, 2020