Brahms: interlude 117B & 119
Schoenberg: Das Buch der hängende Gärten
Brahms: Vier ernste Gesänge

Pilgrim at the Gate of Idleness is a co-production
between
Christianne Stotijn, Marco Borggreve,
De Koninklijke Muntschouwburg Brussels,
Concert- en Congresgebouw De Doelen and
Operadagen Rotterdam
2009 en 2010

Pilgrim at the Gate of Idleness

She is so beautiful and raises such desires in me. Her I wish to follow, to be her slave. If that is not love ... And so we wander and pass through the Gate of Vanity, onto a path that leads us far away from true love. Only disillusion awaits.

Das Buch der hängende Gärten
In a dark wood the narrator meets his heroine, striding in the midst of a procession. He follows her, reaching a paradise world: the hanging gardens. His longing for her grows and gradually becomes obsessive. When they are finally together, he no more than kisses her. Adoration, she says, blocked his desire. Has he failed? His love rejects him. She and her world disappear in a mist.

Christianne Stotijn, mezzosoprano
Joseph Breinl: piano
Wim Trompert: stage director
Marco Borggreve: photography and production
Daan Noppen & Monica Hernandez video art
Uri Rapaport: Lighting Design for Rotterdam
Willem Laarman: Lighting Design for Brussels
Alvin Williams: production management Rotterdam

Following true love, you pass by all worldly temptations. This love is autonomous. She takes you where she wants, even if into death.

Vier ernste Gesänge
Man is like unto cattle, I read in melancholy writings. But have we no soul? Is there no hope of reunion? Can only the present give us joy? I must not complain for the world has been good to me. But how cruel was death who separated us! You still in the midst of life, while the world had nothing for me anymore. I leave all hope and faith, and choose love. How mild death can be.