TIRANA, June 27 – “”Try… Again… Better” will be the first performance dedicated to the works of British avant-garde composer Cornelius Cardew (1936 – 1981) in Albania. With compositions by Germany’s Christian von Borries and Albania’s Vasil S. Tole, supported by the Choir and the Orchestra of the Academy of Arts, the concert scheduled for June 30 at the National Historical Museum in Tirana will feature “The Great Learning” performed by Choir of Equality.
In line with John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen, the composer counts among the most important musicians of the 20th century. However, only a few specialists have turned their attention to the very strands that lead from the composer’s work right into the heart of Albania. From the mid 1970s onwards, Cardew began to focus his artistic concerns increasingly on the Albanian state, a period from which stem a great number of compositions that have only rarely been performed. None of his works has ever been performed in Albania.
The concert “Try… Again… Better” is the first attempt to eventually premiere and contextualize the composer’s musical dedication in the heart of Tirana. It suggests the first site-specific interpretation of Cardew’s musical legacy, but even more so, an original piece in itself: Three distinct composers from Albania, Germany and the Netherlands have been invited to rearrange a selection of his compositions especially for this event, including the first Albanian translation of Cardew’s famous choir piece “The Great Learning”. The works will playfully reiterate parts of the Albanian history, which lies already at the core of Cardew’s work, whilst at the same time providing vital glimpses at the future.
The title draws on Cardew’s lifelong quest to stretch the boundaries of the musical experience and its social impact, defining ‘failure’ not as a defeat but as an impetus to begin anew: Better. In this sense, the composers are given a carte blanche to turn the courtyard of the Historical Museum into a “symposium, an amusement arcade” as Cardew would have put it. A unique event for anyone interested in musical practices off the beaten track.
“Try… Again… Better.” is supported by the Deutschzentrum Tirana, the Goethe-Institut, the Robert Bosch Foundation and FAVA Foundation for Albanian Visual Arts Across Borders. The event is curated by Sonja Lau, a Robert Bosch Cultural Manager.
“Try… Again… Better.”
Cornelius Cardew in Tirana.
Concert (Premiere): June 30, 2012, 8pm. At: The National Historical Museum, Tirana
