The author and theatre director Pedro Kadivar was born in Shiraz (Iran) and fled to France in 1983 during the Iran-Iraq war. He has lived in Berlin since 1996. His novel Unendlich ist die Nacht was published in April 2023 by Bremen-based Sujet Verlag, which is particularly committed to the themes of freedom and migration.
The narrators and main characters are two men: a German who fled from the GDR to West Germany a year before the fall of the Berlin Wall and an Iranian who came to France from Iran in the same year. They have long been a couple and live together. The novel is about their relationship, their encounter in Berlin, their different escape stories in connection with the current reality and the refugee issue in general. It is a Berlin novel in which the German capital and its places play a central role.
For his musical reading of Unendlich ist die Nacht, Pedro Kadivar has invited vocalist Katia Guedes and pianist Susanne Stelzenbach. The interdisciplinary and improvisational performance is characterised by a very free approach to the text, with the aim of enabling deeper access to the novel and revealing it in all its diversity and with regard to its various motifs and themes. The musical level functions as a kind of dialogue translation without duplicating the text.
This will be followed by a discussion with literary critic Sigrid Brinkmann (Deutschlandradio Kultur) and the author about the novel and the musical reading.
After fleeing from Iran, Pedro Kadivar studied literature and theatre studies at the University of Paris III-Sorbonne Nouvelle after graduating from high school in Paris. Impressed by Berlin and his meeting with Heiner Müller during an organised trip for young French theatre directors, he decided to settle in Berlin. In 2002, he completed his doctorate on Marcel Proust at the Institute for Romance Studies at the Humboldt University of Berlin before returning to his work in the theatre. His plays have been performed in France (Odéon – Théâtre de l’Europe, Festival d’Avignon, etc.), in Germany and in England, for which he has received several awards. His Kleines Buch der Migrationen (translated from French by Gernot Krämer) was published in 2018 and his novel Unendlich ist die Nacht in 2023. His play Kunst der Flucht (premiere at the Maxim Gorki Theatre) was shown at the Erfurt Theatre in 2021 and his one-person play Ich höre Euren Atem – Monolog der geflüchteten Schauspielerin premiered in his production in 2024. In 2024 he was awarded a scholarship from the Berlin Senate in the field of literature.
Die aus Brasilien stammende Sängerin und Komponistin Katia Guedes studierte Oboe, Gesang und Komposition an der USP São Paulo sowie an der HfM Hanns Eisler Berlin. Ergänzend absolvierte sie Masterstudien in Musik- und Theaterwissenschaft an der TU und FU Berlin. Als Sopranistin war sie international bei Festivals wie der Biennale Salzburg, MaerzMusik, Ultraschall oder am Teatro Real Madrid zu hören, u. a. mit Ensemble Mosaik, Klangforum Wien, Nieuw Ensemble Amsterdam, den Maulwerkern und den Neuen Vokalsolisten Stuttgart.
Brazilian-born singer and composer Katia Guedes studied oboe, singing and composition at the USP São Paulo and the Hanns Eisler Academy of Music Berlin. She also completed master’s degrees in musicology and theatre studies at the TU and FU Berlin. As a soprano, she has performed internationally at festivals such as the Biennale Salzburg, MaerzMusik, Ultraschall and the Teatro Real Madrid, among others with Ensemble Mosaik, Klangforum Wien, Nieuw Ensemble Amsterdam, the Maulwerker and the Neue Vokalsolisten Stuttgart.
Born in Reudnitz (Thuringia), Susanne Stelzenbach lives in Berlin as a freelance composer and pianist. She studied at the Hanns Eisler Academy of Music in Berlin, where she taught piano from 1976 to 1983. As an interpreter of contemporary music, she was active as a soloist and chamber musician until around 2000 – experiences that had a lasting influence on her composing. Since 1987, she has created a wide range of works for chamber ensemble, orchestra, music theatre, audio formats and text. Her pieces have been performed internationally and broadcast on radio. From 2002 to 2021, she directed the Kunstfest pyramidale in Berlin-Marzahn. Stelzenbach is a member of the composer group Atonale. She has received numerous prizes, scholarships and commissions.
Sigrid Brinkmann studied Roman and German literature in Montpellier, Paris and Berlin. Her focus as a reviewer and feature author (for ARD broadcasters, among others) is on Francophone and Israeli literature. From 2004 to 2024 she presented the cultural magazine Fazit on Deutschlandfunk Kultur, and since 2023 she has been part of the team of presenters of the DLF Büchermarkt. In 2013, she researched in Morocco as a Robert Bosch Foundation Cross-Border Fellow. She was a member of the Prix Premiere jury from 2021 to 2024. In 2021, she founded the bilingual podcast Littéramours.com with Clarisse Cossais, which she has been producing alone since 2022 – including her own translations of all the conversations held.
19:00: soundwalk with Thomas Gerwin
The event is part of the Monat der zeitgenössischen Musik Berlin.
https://www.field-notes.berlin/
