Theater Saarbrücken, Premiere 29.03.2025
Director: Anna-Elisabeth Frick
Stage design and costumes: Martha Pinsker
Choreography: Ted Stoffer
Music: Hannes Strobl
Dramaturgy: Simone Kranz
With: Verena Bukal; Gaby Pochert; Laura Trapp; Lucas Janson; Sébastien Jacobi
Music excerpts:
Musical Concept by Hannes Strobl
Sound and Memory
The theatrical evening “Lethe. An Evening of Lost Memories” is dedicated to the phenomenon of forgetting and makes use of the unique ability of sound and music to revive past situations or evoke specific atmospheres. Sound can awaken memories that have long disappeared into the background of consciousness – even when other paths to the past have faded.
A song from the time of first love, the chirping of crickets on vacation, or the familiar rumble of a passing train near the home where one grew up – such sounds can trigger deeply rooted memories. This insight forms the basis of the sound design, which deliberately uses elements to stimulate emotional and associative processes.
In addition, the composition incorporates audio recordings (field recordings) that refer to the former use of the Alte Feuerwache as a gymnasium. The squeaking of sneakers, distant voices, or the echo of a ball make the past of the space audible – the room tells its story.
A Field of Tension Created Through Diverse Sonic Elements
Musically, the composition moves between repetition and dissolution, between the familiar and the unexpected. This tension is created using various sonic tools: loops can be understood as a metaphor for forgetting – each repeated sound fragment seems new, as if being heard for the first time. Continuous sound layers create a sense of disappearance: they remain present but are gradually tuned out unconsciously, like the monotonous hum of a fan or the distant noise of a street.
Sudden breaks and fragments reflect moments of memory loss or disorientation.
Thus, the composition is not only about capturing forgetting through sound but also about making the emotional power of sound as a bridge to memory perceptible. Music becomes a medium between what is lost and what is found, between forgetting and remembering.