The Head & The Load

William Kentridge, Philip Miller, Thuthuka Sibisi, Gregory Maqoma

genre

music theatre
Date

29 - May 31, 2019
Location

Theater Amsterdam

William Kentridge’s latest production, which takes its title from the Ghanaian proverb ‘the head and the load are the troubles of the neck,’ opens the 2019 Holland Festival with a grand spectacle. The work, featuring music by long-time collaborator Phillip Miller with Thuthuka Sibisi and choreography by Gregory Maqoma, illuminates the plight of the nearly two million African porters and carriers used by the British, French, and Germans who bore the brunt of the casualties during the First World War in Africa – a tragic story of immense historical significance that has remained largely untold. Kentridge’s unique vision brings together an international ensemble cast of musicians, singers, dancers, and performers alongside film projections and shadow play to create a landscape of extraordinary proportion and imagination that unfolds across a 50-meter wide stage. download the programme book

dates

Wed May 29 2019 8:30 PM

Thu May 30 2019 3:00 PM

Thu May 30 2019 8:30 PM

Fri May 31 2019 8:30 PM

information

English, French, Italian, Shangaan, Shona, Zoeloe, Pedi, Xhosa, Wolof, Madinga, Swahili
Duration of performance unknown (geen pauze)

‘The Head & the Loadis about Africa and Africans in the First World War, that is to say about all the contradictions and paradoxes of colonialism that were heated and compressed by circumstances

of the war. It is about historical incomprehension (and inaudibility and invisibility). The colonial logic towards the black participants could be summed up. ‘Lest their actions merit recognition, their deeds must not be recorded.’ The Head & The Load aims to recognize and record.’ ¬-William Kentridge

William Kentridge’s exploration of Africa’s role in the First World War combines music, dance, film projections, mechanized sculptures and shadow play to illuminate the untold story of the millions of African porters and carriers who served—and in many cases died for—British, French and German battlefield forces. Freighted with the weight of this little-examined history and quickened by Kentridge’s visionary theatrical alchemy and a play on the Ghanaian proverb, ‘the head and the load are the troubles of the neck’, The Head & The Load is an exceptionally ambitious and large-scale work of performance.

William Kentridge is a remarkably versatile artist who combines the political with the poetic through artistic media as diverse as printmaking, drawing, painting, sculpting, and filmmaking. Dealing with subjects such as apartheid, colonialism, and totalitarianism, his highly personal work is often imbued with lyrical undertones in his critical examination of aspects of his native South African society and the aftermath of apartheid.

The Head & The Load sees Kentridge work with his longtime collaborator Philip Miller, one of South Africa’s leading composers, and choreographer and principle dancer Gregory Maqoma to create what the artist describes as ‘an interrupted musical procession’. This rich and multi-layered performance features an international cast of singers, dancers, and performers, a majority directly from South Africa. Miller’s powerful and evocative compositions offer a perfect complement to Kentridge’s imaginative work.

The music for The Head & The Load is a dialogue between two different sound worlds which emerged during and straight after the first world war. Exploring how European artists and composers of the Dada movement broke down the borders between spoken text and music, and how this avant-garde movement connects surprisingly with the sound world of the African choral music, and song- often performed with fluid interplay between spoken word and singing. The expression of these sound worlds take the forms of musical collisions and mistranslations between these musical forces.

Europe reacts to the war with the birth of post romantic music, with composers like Hindemith, Schoenberg which are taken into our sound-world, stretched, inverted and then reflected back from Africa with vocal war chants, laments and marching processional brass bands. A cabaret song by Schoenberg is intercut with the percussive rhythmical slaps of the Christian hymn books sent to Africa as part of the colonial mission. A rich, sweet violin waltz by Fritz Kreisler is obliterated by a Zulu war song. A recording of a speech of Wilhelm Kaiser is reduced to vocal percussive consonants of his words alluding to the absurdist poems of Kurt Schwitters. Even when this hybridity of musical traditions open up into moments of glorious ensemble singing of African songs from the time, they are constantly fighting, and shouting back, and resisting the raucous musical soundscapes of the European war, using a band of orchestral instruments to become sirens, foghorns and radio frequencies, engaging with the modernist movement in music which emerged as a consequence of the trauma of the first world war.

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credits

concept William Kentridge direction William Kentridge music Philip Miller cocomposer Thuthuka Sibisi music director Thuthuka Sibisi design projection Catherine Meyburgh choreography Gregory Maqoma set Sabine Theunissen light design Urs Schönebaum, Georg Veit sound design Mark Grey video editing, composition Žana Marović, Catherine Meyburgh, Janus Fouché associate director Luc de Wit head of engineering studio Chris Waldo de Wet video Kim Gunning cinematography Duško Marović instrumentation Michael Atkinson, Philip Miller additional instrumentation by Nathan Koci actors Mncedisi Shabangu, Hamilton Dlamini, Nhlanhla Mahlangu, Luc de Wit vocalists and performers Nhlanhla Mahlangu, Tlale Makhene, Sipho Seroto, Joanna Dudley, Ann Masina, Bham Ntabeni dancers Gregory Maqoma, Nhlanhla Mahlangu, Xolani Dlamini, Thulani Chauke, Julia Zenzie Burnham ensemble vocalists Tshegofatso Moeng, Bulelani Madondile, Lubabalo Velebayi, Eddie Mofokeng, Motho Oa Batho, Lindokuhle Thabede, Mhlaba Buthelezi, Ayanda Eleki, Grace Magubane, Ncokwane Lydia Manyama, Mapule Moloi violin Waldo Alexander percussion Sam Budish bass Shawn Conley trumpet Samuel Ewens viola Mario Gotoh French horn Deepa Goonetilleke accordion Will Holshouser trombone Nicolas Jones flute Myles Roberts kora N`Faly Kouyate commissioned by Ruhrtriennale, MASS MoCA, Park Avenue Armory, 14-18 NOW: WW1 Centenary Commissions with additional support by Holland Festival with the support of Alessia Bulgari, Agnes Gund, Wendy Fisher leading support for development Daniel R. Lewis, Jennifer & Jonathan Allan Soros, Brenda R. Potter additional support by Simeon Bruner, the JKW Foundation, Sarah McNair, Randal Fippinger, Bill & Sako Fisher, Quaternaire, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation developed at North Adams, MASS MoCA, 2018 production Lynn Koek, Laurie Cearley, THE OFFICE performing arts + film Rachel Chanoff in participation with Quaternaire producer Brendon Boyd technique Mike Edelman sound engineer Michele Greco stage manager Sara Sahin costume supervision Judith Stokart costumes Claudine Grinwis, Emmanuelle Erhart, Bert Menzel assistant stage manager Lissy Barnes-Flint William Kentridge Studio Linda Leibowitz, Anne McIlleron company manager Carol Blanco