Sing für mich, Tod

Claude Vivier remains one of the most enigmatic composers of the twentieth century. Despite his untimely death at the age of 34, Franco-Canadian Vivier left behind a singular and extensive body of work. In its individuality and spirituality, it is like a lone star in an empty sky. Ultimately, Vivier threw himself into this dark night, ending his life in what can be regarded as a final, definitive dramatic performance. Vivier was found stabbed in his Paris hotel room, his body crouched over an unfinished score containing an eerie premonition of his death: Crois-tu en l’immortalité de l’âme? / Do you believe in the immortality of the soul?

A man encapsulates his life in music, and in doing so increasingly blurs the line between life and art and ends his work by fusing both: through a violent death at the hands of a male gigolo. The project, Sing für mich, Tod (Sing for me, Death) reconstructs life as art, seeking to explode the boundaries between performance and reality.

The dramatist Albert Ostermaier has created a monologue based on Vivier’s life story.  David Herman (direction) and Christof Hetzer (design) explore the circumstances of Vivier’s death, using Ostermaier’s text and a selection of Vivier’s own compositions

A production commissioned by the Ruhrtriennale with music by Claude Vivier.