Das Phantom der Operette

In the organizer's words:

Performance of La Fleur after Emmerich Kálmán
In German and French

The operetta is the nucleus of modern entertainment. Full of wit, tempo and emotion, it combines great melodies with trenchant acting and a fine view of society. But because it also stands for waltzing, couplets and questionable jokes, it is sometimes considered an outdated genre today. Wrongly so, according to the German-Ivorian collective "La Fleur". Their performance takes a fresh look at the operetta of the early 20th century, starting with the music and biography of the Hungarian-Jewish composer Emmerich Kálmán, whose works such as "Die Csárdásfürstin" are among the most successful operettas of the time. Kálmán had to flee into exile from the National Socialists, his music was banned and only rediscovered after the war. His story points to the political ruptures hidden behind the apparent lightness of the operetta. It quickly becomes clear that "La Fleur" does not see the operetta as a nostalgic form of entertainment, but as an open, politically charged sound space - with a post-colonial perspective, multilingual and formally expanded. Accompanied by a string quintet that interweaves historical melodies with contemporary sounds, they uncover layer after layer. Singing, dancing and reflecting, they look behind the glittering façade, making global interdependencies, ruptures critical of racism and political narratives visible - and audible. "The Phantom of the Operetta" is a highly entertaining evening that shows operetta as an art form between desire, transformation and resistance. Afterwards, we want to give it our all on the dancefloor. Timor Litzenberger, sound artist of the performance group "La Fleur" and specialist for beats that know no cultural boundaries, will provide the sound. www.lafleur.direct La Fleur in co-production with Steirischer Herbst, Kampnagel, FFT, Pumpenhaus Münster. Supported by the Daku fund. This content has been machine translated.