Together with Muziekgebouw Productiehuis and De School, Het HEM presents a new immersive music performance by American composer, theatre director and performance maker Asa Horvitz, known for his dreamlike art experiences in which different dimensions of our existence converge. Inspired by the death of his father and many of his father's relatives, Asa Horvitz and his colleagues in Ghost sing lyrics created by an AI system with hundreds of books about death, loss and mourning used as input–creating a space in which the audience can wander, dream and associate on the topics of death, loss, memories, archives. Part of this project will be presented on The Couch–making Ghost the first project by Het HEM to take place in a hybrid form.
Asa set these lyrics to music along with musician/performers Carmen Q. Rothwell and Ariadne Randall, and invited his uncle (and his father’s brother), American pianist and composer Wayne Horvitz to join them. Together they created Ghost, a performance in which singing words from the AI system becomes a way to mourn together, a musical version of the Jewish practice of sitting shiva, neither music nor theatre nor choreography, but something unrecognizable yet familiar, in which the present is suspended and performers and spectators together attend to the presence of the past and the death.
Ghost was made possible with the support of artistic partner Muziekgebouw Productiehuis.
Artistic Direction: Asa Horvitz
With and by: Asa Horvitz, Wayne Horvitz, Ariadne Randall, Carmen Rothwell
AI system design: Seraphina Goldfarb-Tarrant, Alejandro Calcaño
Horn band: Pablo Nicolas Rojo Anguita, Lezaam Beets, Michael Moore, Ada Rave, Goncalo Soares, Fie Schouten
Collaboration on stage and costume design: Evandro Pedroni
AI UX Design: XandraDave Cochran
Lighting assistance: Theo Emil Krausz
Custom Shirts & Flags: Le Van Hung
Ceramics: Jacob Bartmann
Hat maker: Monica Gamberale
Advice: Oneka von Schrader, Joachim Robbrecht
Production: Sophie Menzinger, Theo Krausz (AT) Waffa al-Attas, Nora Duijf (NL)
Performance text generated by the AI system, except “94.7 the wave” by Ariadne Randall, “to think about ghosts” by Wayne Horvitz, and “drown in matter” by Asa Horvitz. All essay text by Asa Horvitz
Previous versions of GHOST included contributions from Bryan West, Martin Brans, Esy Casey, and David Bruin
Booklet design and selected images by Nica Horvitz
Produced by Golden Trout Wilderness (NL/USA), in association with Celestial Excursions Vienna and SHOW MACHINE (NL). Co-production: SPRING Performing Arts Festival, Het HEM, Muziekgebouw Productiehuis, Frascati Producties, Musiktheatertage Wien, brutWien. With the kind support of the City of Vienna’s Department of Cultural Affairs, BMKOES, Amsterdam Fonds voor Kunst, Gemeente Utrecht, Amsterdam Zuid, KlavierLoft. Residency/development: Goethe Institut Hong Kong, wpZimmer, deSingel, Microscope Gallery NYC, Camargo Foundation, MacDowell, DAS Theatre, ELIAS 2069.
