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Thursday 28 September - Sunday 1 October 2000
 A
festival directed by Tan Dun Invited by the Barbican Centre to direct
a cross art-form festival, Chinese-American composer Tan Dun has created
Fire Crossing Water (Thursday 28 September - Sunday 1 October), a weekend
of multi-media events that will bring together collaborators of Tan's,
many of whom are also his friends. These partners, "creators without
boundaries", all share a similar ideology and outlook and include
Yo-Yo Ma, Mark O'Connor, Ang Lee, James Schamus, Ping Chong, Bill Viola
and Peter Sellars amongst others.
The festival will include three UK premieres by Tan Dun, contrasted with
works by Bach, Crumb, Shostakovich and Varèse plus the first ever
visit to the UK by the Zhang Jia Jie Cymbal Ensemble from Tan Dun's
birthplace, Hunan Province. There will be performances of Ping Chong's
Japanese ghost story Kwaidan, free music, a Bill Viola video/sound installation,
an Ang Lee film series, a family concert led by Yo-Yo Ma and Ben Haggarty,
plus talks led by Peter Sellars.
Fire Crossing Water will create a series of genuine cross art-form collaborations,
forging a new language through the artists' creative imaginations,
crossing cultures and boundaries and exploring the themes of myth and
ritual, ancient spirituality and the avant-garde.
Tan's own life is an extraordinary and unique journey, both physical
and artistic, from Central Hunan to downtown Manhattan. His music draws
from his life: crossing continents and mixing elements; combining new
technology and his own historical and spiritual background. Themes running
throughout the weekend are music and film, percussion and tradition, and
death and resurrection:
Music & Film
 Fire
Crossing Water is launched on Thursday 28 September with the start of
an Ang Lee film season, including a screen talk with Ang Lee and James
Schamus. Like Tan Dun, this Taiwanese-born director, whose works have
included "Sense & Sensibility" and "The Ice Storm"
left his Chinese family (then based in Taiwan) for the USA where he quickly
established himself as a wry chronicler of the culture-clash between traditional
Taiwan and modern America. His work with James Schamus who co-produced
and wrote the screenplays for "The Ice Storm" and "Ride
with the Devil" and whose film company made Lee's earlier pieces,
has led to their latest collaboration, a Beijing-based Samurai work fired
by Lee's childhood fantasies of romantic stories and martial arts films:
"Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" with music by Tan Dun.
The Ang Lee film season includes "The Wedding Banquet" (Thursday
28 September), "Eat Drink Man Woman" and "Sense and Sensibility"
(Saturday 30 September), "The Ice Storm" and "Ride with
the Devil" (Sunday 1 October).
The first concert of the festival, Friday 29 September, presents "Crouching
Tiger", the world premiere of a music and video concerto using images
inspired by this new film "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" which
will be introduced by Peter Sellars in conversation with Ang Lee, James
Schamus and Tan Dun. The cellist Yo-Yo Ma features both here and in the
first half of the concert performing one of Shostakovich's most enigmatic
chamber works Piano Trio No 2 in E Minor with Kathryn Stott (piano) and
Pamela Frank (violin) which is not part of the film.
Percussion & Tradition
Yo-Yo Ma leads the second concert, Saturday 30 September, which commemorates
the 250th anniversary of JS Bach's death with his Cello Suite No
4 followed by Tan Dun's Water Passion after St Matthew, his own response
to Bach's St Matthew Passion. The programme also includes the short
cello sonata by George Crumb.
"When I read the account of the Passion in the bible, I only hear
the wind, the sound of the desert, the storm and the water, so I shaped
the story through the sound of water, and storms, and through the sound
of the desert, which I get through the fiddle playing of Yo-Yo Ma and
Mark O'Connor" (Tan Dun).
A short performance in the interval by the Zhang Jia Jie Cymbal Ensemble,
an inspiration for Tan Dun, leads the audience from the percussive sounds
of Hunan Province to the water, stones and percussion elements in the
Passion (FreeStage). These traditional cymbal players have never performed
before outside China. Their music is that of the Tujia People - one
of China's 56 minority peoples dating back a thousand years. These
inspiring and natural musicians tell stories through their instruments,
playing out dramas, captivating and entrancing with their virtuosity and
humour. As well as cymbal playing their programme includes Tujia Nationality
Hand Waving Dance, Haocao Gong and Drum music and Xiangxi nuoxi -
West Hunan exorcism drama.
Death & Resurrection
The closing concert, Sunday 1 October, adds a further multi-media dimension
to the Festival with international video artist Bill Viola's evocative
video response to Edgar Varèse's tone poem Deserts. Varèse's
composition uses taped sound collages that interrupt the live music and
Viola visually develops this structure. The film uses the music's
structure to describe the stark contrast of a solitary man alone in a
windowless room with the diverse scenes of an external world devoid of
people - a kaleidoscope of deserts. The editing together of visual
and score is immaculate. The work will be performed by the BBC Symphony
Orchestra conducted by Pierre André Valade and is followed by a
discussion between Bill Viola and Peter Sellars, long-time supporter and
curator of his work.
From 21 September through until 7 October, there will also be a presentation
of a video/sound installation Threshold 1992 by Bill Viola on the Stalls
Foyer (Level -1). Internationally acknowledged for his video installations,
Bill Viola creates total environments that envelop the viewer in image
and sound. Many of these focus on universal experiences such as life and
death. His installation Threshold 1992 shows an electronic display sign
mounted on the outer walls that scrolls news information with up-to-date
reports on the daily events. Inside is a dark inner room with projections
of sleeping figures and the sound of regular breathing - an internal space
that exists beneath the incessant flow of worldly events.
Concluding the festival is the UK premiere of Tan Dun's Orchestral
Theatre IV: The Gate in which he explores his own personal interest in
multi-media and multi-culturism. The piece is a commemoration of people
sacrificed for true love and features three women who committed suicide
for love, waiting for the judgement which will allow them to pass through
the gate where their souls will be reborn. Alongside a traditional Chinese
opera singer (Yu-Ji, heroine of Farewell My Concubine, 19th Century Peking
Opera) and Juliet from Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet (16th Century
England) performed by a traditional western soprano, Tan has placed Koharu-san
(from the Love Suicides at Amijima Chikamatsu, 18th Century Japan) -
a traditional Japanese puppeteer. This work also includes a video artist
and water percussion.
"This piece is heading further into experimentation,...more closely
approaching my dreams" (Tan Dun)
In it Tan Dun continues his exploration and celebration of multiculturalism
through the use of multi-media, breaking down perceived boundaries between
cultures and art forms. Peter Sellars will introduce the performance in
conversation with Tan Dun.
Kwaidan
Throughout the festival there are performances of Ping Chong's full-scale
multi-media rod-and-shadow puppet performance-work "Kwaidan",
which features three Japanese ghost stories performed by a cast of puppeteers
and one actor. Ping Chong is a seminal figure among Asian American artists
whose work combines the influences of East and West. His prestigious and
award winning career spans the roles of theatre director, choreographer
and video and installation artist. These performances take place in the
Pit Theatre as part of BITE:00, the Barbican's international theatre
season. The season also includes a workshop on Saturday 30 September.
Associated Events
Other Fire Crossing Water workshops include an illustrated sound and image
talk (Garden Room, Saturday 30 September) led by Tan Dun, David Cossin
and other performers from the festival exploring the sound worlds of Eastern
and Western percussion traditions, a workshop from Mark O'Connor
and an introduction to Beijing Opera with Tan Dun and Shanghai Beijing
Opera theatre star Shi Min. "Beyond the Silk Road, with Yo-Yo Ma"
on Sunday 1 October, Cinema 1, is a magical journey along the Silk Route,
from China through to the West with Yo-Yo Ma performing a selection of
short pieces, exploring the different musical traditions and cultures
along the route illustrated with the imaginative words of storyteller
Ben Haggarty. Peter Sellars and Bill Viola will give a sound/image discussion
on Sunday 1 October after the performance of Viola/Varèse Deserts.
Continuing the Barbican's principle of programming free events, free
activities take place throughout the weekend in the Conservatory and on
the FreeStage. These include the Western debut from the Jiang Jia Jie
Cymbal Ensemble from the Hunan Province and another performance from Mark
O'Connor (both FreeStage Friday 29 September) and the second performance
from the Cymbal Ensemble (FreeStage Saturday 30 September). A special
performance with introduction from the Cymbal Ensemble takes place in
the Conservatory on Sunday 1 October and a chamber concert featuring earlier
works by Tan Dun will be presented by the Guildhall School of Music and
Drama (Sunday 1 October, St Giles' Church).
Related links:
Tan
Dun - Biography- read more about Dun's background and development.
Tan
Dun's Official Site
Yo-Yo Ma's Official
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