"Judith" A biblical drama from medićval Croatia "Judith" with Ensemble Dialogos Sunday, November 2, 2008 at 8:00 pm Pre-Concert Introduction by Sanda Herzic at 7:15 pm UBC Recital Hall 6361 Memorial Road, UBC campus Vancouver, Canada Complex and full of metamorphoses, Katarina Livljanić’s interpretation of this story, rooted in the Dalmatian Renaissance, transforms a Biblical narration into a theatrical experience, woven around characters who have emerged from the text to become profoundly human and alive for us today. PERFORMED BY: Ensemble Dialogos (Paris) Katarina Livljanić voice, direction Albrecht Maurer fiddle, lirica Norbert Rodenkirchen flutes Sanda Herzic staging, scenography and costumes Marie Bellot lighting design and direction N O T E S From the tense atmosphere of a besieged city, a woman's voice rises. A single voice - in turn embodying a storyteller, a powerful general, a pious yet seductive woman, or a soul and body in dialogue - leads the listener through the sinuous Biblical story of Judity and Holofernes. Complex and full of metamorphoses, Katarina Livljanić's interpretation of this story, rooted in the Dalmatian Renaissance, transforms a Biblical narration into a theatrical experience, woven around characters who have emerged from the text to become profoundly human and alive for us today. The mysterious sonorities of Dalmatian Glagolitic chant form the musical structure of this dramatic story. Accompanying the voice, rich sounds of medićval fiddle and flutes give Marko Marulić's text a unique dramatic colour. Story Judith is a pious Hebrew woman, but she is also a beautiful and dangerous enchantress who infiltrates the palace of the Assyrian enemy, seduces the powerful general Holofernes and beheads him. The Agony of Judith tells this cruel story of Eros and Thanatos in an intimate and very intriguing way, using fragments of medićval disputationes from the Glagolitic tradition (also known as "agonies"), which alternate with the main story. These interpolated episodes allow us to leave the main action for a moment and hear what is happening inside the characters' minds:  just as Holofernes' head separates from his body, his thoughts also "separate" into a very lucid dialogue between his body and his soul which happens in the moment of drunken sleep, before his death. A different inner dialogue - between Judith’s mind and her soul - occurs in the head of the heroine as she prays to God to help her kill the enemy who is in love with her. Background Musically, this project is a reconstruction, using Gregorian, Beneventan and Glagolitic sources of medićval Dalmatia, as well as the study of Glagolitic chant in oral tradition. The text of Judith survives without music but its metrical structure corresponds to a small number of archaic Glagolitic melodies used for storytelling in medićval Dalmatia, often in the context of the highly emotional and dramatic songs related to the Passion or rituals of the Holy Week. The text itself also refers to texts sung in the liturgical offices, so the task of reconstruction was to find, in related musical sources (Dalmatian and southern Italian), melodies corresponding to the suggestions of the original text. In this research, it was necessary to study the most archaic layers of what is called Glagolitic chant. This liturgical repertoire, sung in the local vernacular tongue (Croatian Church Slavonic) while actually belonging to the Roman rite, was preserved in manuscripts written in the Glagolitic alphabet, used in mediaeval Croatia. Written sources mention the existence of this chant in Dalmatia as early as the 11th century, within the circles of clergymen who didn't speak Latin. Yet, the particularity of the Glagolitic repertoire, passed on orally, is its survival up to the present day in a few locations along the Croatian coast, on the Dalmatian islands and in Istria. In this musical monodrama, Judith & Holofernes, with all the personified demons inhabiting the inner world of their minds, are performed by a female voice playing several roles and using a wide spectrum of vocal nuances, a fiddle, a lirica (Croatian traditional stringed instrument tuned in a particular archaic manner) and archaic flutes. They build together a story which unfolds in growing emotional density, transposing this ancient tale, with its powerful and nostalgic Dalmatian melodies, into an intriguing theatrical context. Source: Early Music, Vancouver, Canada

Katarina Livljanić with Albrecht Maurer and Norbert Rodenkirchen

D I A L O G O S Since its foundation in 1997, Dialogos, the vocal ensemble directed and created by Katarina Livljanić, has emerged as one of the most outstanding and original medićval music ensembles of the new generation. The ensemble's projects link new musicological research with an innovative approach to medićval music performance, a theatrical dimension, and an expressive musicality. Dialogos is composed of both women's and men's vocal ensembles. Since its first projects Dialogos has been acclaimed by critics (in journals such as Le Monde, Le Figaro, Diapason, Los Angeles Times) and has toured in many European countries (in all main early music festivals in France (Ambronay, Saintes, Rencontres du Thoronnet, Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord, Voix et Route romane…), Germany (Romanische Sommer Cologne, Herne… ), Holland (Utrecht Festival), Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Croatia (Dubrovnik, Zagreb, Zadar), Belgum, USA, Canada, North Africa and Latin America), including radio and television broadcasts. Their CDs Terra Adriatica (released on the Empreinte digitale label), Lombards & Barbares and La Vision de Tondal (released on the Arcana label), and Chant Wars (a coproduction with the ensemble Sequentia, released on the Sony-BMG label) have received press distinctions in international music magazines, including Diapason d'or, Choc du Monde de la musique, Goldberg 5 stars). Current programmes of the ensemble focus on the archaic medićval repertoires : plainchant from Southern Europe and musical theatre. Among the theatrical programmes, there is a Glagolitic Tondal's Vision, staged by Sanda Herzic (in collaboration with Yoshi Oida, one of Peter Brook's principal actors) which was released as a CD in the spring of 2004 and was awarded the prestigious Diapason d'or de l’année 2004 and the Coup de cœur 2005 by the Académie Charles Cros. The project Chant Wars, a coproduction with the ensemble Sequentia, is centred on Carolingian chant and local traditions in Europe in the 9th and 10th centuries. Recent programmes include Abbo Abbas…, an innovative vision of 11th-century English polyphony. Judith, a staged production of a biblical story from medićval Dalmatia, was premiered at the Ambronay Festival in 2006. It received the award of the Split Festival (Croatia) for the best musical performance in 2007. Source: Early Music, Vancouver, Canada For more information see www.ensemble-dialogos.org

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