In the summer of 2018, De Warme Winkel and the Netherlands Chamber Choir will erect a monumental production – Gesualdo – on the foundations of everything that attracts and repels us as human beings: the trinity Violence / Art / Sex. The starting points are the collaboration between De Warme Winkel and the renowned Netherlands Chamber Choir and themes from the life and work of composer and prince Carlo Gesualdo (1566-1613). Gesualdo lived an anguished, controversial life in his palaces in Southern Italy. The way in which he murdered his wife and her lover would make O.J. Simpson blush; the revolutionary music he composed would make Phil Spector sink to his knees in admiration; the way he dealt with servants would impress the Marquis de Sade. When listening to his devotional responsories, can we see the swing in which he swung his bastard baby to death? In his madrigals, can we taste the menstrual fluids he drank to sate his inner demons?

The Netherlands Chamber Choir has sung Gesualdo’s repertoire from New York to Taipei, but seldom can his work have come more alive than among the blood and urine of an all-star cast composed of hard-core Warme Winkel cadres Mara, Vincent and Ward and their young acolytes Florian Myjer and Marieke De Zwaan.

The contrast between choir and theatre company, between Gesualdo’s perverse excesses and lucid music, is the engine powering a search for ‘the sublime’ – that which is abhorrent and yet at the same time irresistible.

The production will première on 22 June during the Holland Festival.

Idea Tido Visser, De Warme Winkel
Concept and performance Vincent Rietveld, Mara van Vlijmen, Ward Weemhoff, Florian Myjer and Marieke de Zwaan
Vocal ensemble and performance Netherlands Chamber Choir
Musical supervision Bo Koek
Design Marloes en Wikke
Costumes Bernadette Corstens
Sound design Will-Jan Pielage
Lighting design Prem Scholte Albers
Co-production Holland Festival and de Singel Antwerpen