Coronation I-VI course at Wien Modern: Olga Neuwirth and the balance between tradition and modernity

In the Wien Modern, your entire “Corning from 1st to 6th” tournament will be performed for the first time. What is it all about this chain of business?
The course was created during the lockdown period on the initiative of various teams and organisations, at a time when it was important to stay active and not disappear completely and be forgotten. But I would have been glad that after a grueling training and performance period for ‘Orlando’ and five years of composing, there could finally be peace. The “Second Coronation” came on the initiative of Daniel Barenboim, “The Fifth Coronation” by the Gorzenich Orchestra in Cologne and so on.

Was the lockdown particularly difficult for you?
For me it went from 180 to zero. 2020 was the busiest and most exciting year in terms of international shows and stays, and then suddenly everything was cancelled. I was in Styria and I looked at my mother there. Planted in the beautiful garden my grandfather planted, my dog ​​walked a lot and went back to nature photography, which I often did when I was little. In some “garland” on the specimens you can hear the sounds of nature from the garden. Unfortunately, there are no more frogs, which I have had a lot of recordings from 25 years ago, but I have made an incredible number of birds that I haven’t heard of in a long time. For the other clips, I asked friends all over the world to say “No!” response to the situation.

This was your way of dealing with silence.
exactly. Oddly enough, the pieces became very short, except for one, which is way too long for that. This is what it felt like to me: Pieces explored extremes. All parts of this course are protocol and rethinking of my configuration. Fourth coronation: Who brought me here. An immersive composition performance with light changes that should remind us of Monet’s “Nymphéas” in which the audience can move as freely as in an exhibition. Everyday life was always so similar that I lost the idea of ​​time. I guess yes, none of us found our way back to our idea of ​​time.