Kim Brandstrup
SONGS OF A WAYFARER
Premiere
August 2, 2004 by Rambert Dance Company at The Playhouse, Edinburgh as part of a Mahler triple-bill for the Edinburgh Festival, which also included Dark Elegies by Antony Tudor and Five Ruckert Songs by Peter Darrell.
Further Performances
September 3, 4, 2004 – The Playhouse, Edinburgh
February 24, 25, 2006 – Snape Maltings, Suffolk (in mixed-bill with Constant Speed, Divine Information and Momenta)
Creative Team
Commissioner
Rambert Dance Company
Music
Gustav Mahler ‘Songs of a Wayfarer’
Choreography
Kim Brandstrup
Designs
Steven Scott
Lighting
Steven Scott
Dancers
Thomasin Gulgec
Ana Lujan Sanchez
Artists of Rambert Dance Company
Singer
Gerald Finley - Edinburgh performances only
Orchestra
Royal Scottish National Orchestra
Conductor
Paul Hoskins
SONGS OF A WAYFARER
Rambert Dance Company | Edinburgh Festival
The Playhouse, Edinburgh , August 2, 2004
Review Extracts
"The focal dances are physically exciting and emotionally expressive, a tussle of desire, rejection, pity and regret, especially moving when Lujan Sanchez, tender and torn, cradles Gulgec’s head before quitting him for ever. This is a moving work, economically eloquent, set against a handsome, glowing decor by Steven Scot."
- David Dougill, The Sunday Times
"...this realisation of Mahler's song-cycle shows Brandstrup as very perceptive in realising the griefs and hopes of the text's "world and dreams", searchingly danced by Thomasin Gülgeç and Ana Luján Sanchez.
“...The Brandstrup Wayfarer Songs is sensitive, very well made – I admired the added sharpness given by sudden naturalistic gesture – musically alert, and traces the young man’s anguish as his beloved ever eludes him.”
- Clement Crisp, Financial Times
“..superbly musical. Brandstrup’s articulation of Mahler’s restless dynamics and the range of his invention across solo and group dances never looked better.”
- Judith Mackrell, The Guardian
“It’s a major piece by a master of modern-dance expressiveness.”
Ismene Brown, The Daily Telegraph
“I love Brandstrup’s response to Mahler for its angry eloquence.”
Jann Parry, The Observer