Diary meets memory

Concept programs with a common thread - that is the trademark of the Kuss Quartet. The latest idea: a Beethoven program that transcends genre boundaries, exploring the field of tension between external constraints and inner freedom, exploring the contrast between desire and reality in which the composer moved throughout his life. The string quartet will be joined by the Berlin music theater ensemble "Nico and the Navigators," with whom the quartet had already collaborated on its "Muss es sein" project. Actually, the co-production "Force and Freedom" directed by Nicola Hümpel would have celebrated its premiere at the Schwetzingen Festival in May, but due to Corona it had to be postponed until 2021. This was followed by the transformation into a digital diary project, which is an immediate reaction to the new situations we encounter in the Corona pandemic. Music is made from isolation, without feedback from an audience. This is done in "Force and Freedom" with small clips that show unusual and varied scenes: There are burning notes, highway bridges, cats playing with metronomes, and other bizarrenesses - all of this underpinned by the Kuss Quartet's recording of Beethoven's quartets (recently released on the Rubikon Classics label). The sum of the 29 diary entries adds up to the whole, and a playful memory beckons at the end. A refreshing video project in times of streaming flood.

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