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ON STAGE: BÉATRICE JACCARD,
MASSIMO BERTINELLI,
FRANÇOIS GENDREIDEA: MASSIMO BERTINELLI,
FRANÇOIS GENDRE DIRECTOR/STAGE SET/LIGHTING:
PETER
SCHELLING MUSIC/COMPOSITION: MASSIMO BERTINELLI,
FRANÇOIS GENDRE, BÉATRICE
JACCARD
CHOREOGRAPHY: BÉATRICE
JACCARD
VIDEO: PETER
SCHELLING LIGHTING DESIGNER: ALAIN
MENÉTREY
VIDEO CUT /ASSISTANT STAGE SET: SERGEJ NIKOKOSHEV
PRODUCTION MANAGER: BEATRICE ROSSI
Technical
Zone
In this offbeat piece, which is a musical concert in dance, compagnie
drift tries to surprise the audience and itself.
Musically and scientifically, we investigate the question of whether
the inaudible can be made audible.
How does a fly scream when it bumps into a burning-hot light bulb,
for example?
What does Mr Fish say to Ms Fish when it asks for her fin in marriage?
What does the rose whisper when the sun comes up?
What would we hear in the garden at night if we had more suitable
ears?
All these inaudible noises have been gathered with the aid of special
equipment. Out of the now audible sounds, we have composed music
and turned it into a concert.
We also take a look at the feelings of the scientific staff that
for many years have devoted all their efforts to these not insignificant
questions.
press excerpts
“...With the comic-satirical concert théâtral, Drift took its audience on a trip to the world of sound experiment – thereby showing how fish can make proposals of marriage and how charming an unusually imaginative production can be...The surreal world of ‘Machine à sons’ is exemplified above all by video projections created by Peter Schelling....like the one of the fish which sits like a white falcon on the hand of Gendre, singing in his ear....The balancing act between the outwardly comic and the hidden intention was successful...”
baz, Basle, 25th September 2006
„...Famous for their study of the absurd in everyday life, their multi-media show "machine a sons" (sound machine) is refreshingly original and showcases an amazing range of talent and rare performance style...
Needless to say, this is a dreamlike, surreal show..."we are not funny and we do not want to be funny, but sometimes we cannot help it because life is like this." HA! This group is very funny, no matter how serious they play it... in the end... you're left to reflect on this tangle of bewildering, poignant images.sandiego.comreview, 16.4.2006
“…In “machine à sons,” every part – theatre, music, dance, visual – is so fully developed that if you listed, minute by minute, what was going on, it would take 20 pages… The show is also a concert – composed by the performers – of gurgles, pops, thumps and songs, often electronically distorted . . . until a moment of astonishing beauty, when Jaccard plays a wistful air on the accordion and Bertinelli reveals a high tenor (almost a countertenor) of ravishing purity. ..Jaccard choreographed, and she's a riveting mover who sometimes explodes into a Calvinist belly dance – perfect abdominal undulations but a closed face and held-in sensuality. All three performers use a wonderfully jerky style as if someone were zapping their joints with electric shocks... “machine à sons” is also a complex, fascinating piece of visual art. Peter Schelling designed the set with its sprouting wires and vegetables in specimen jars. He also did the video that blends seamlessly with the live performance… Compagnie Drift calls its work surrealist, and certainly “machine à sons” contains the odd juxtapositions and hallucinatory intensity of surrealist art…”
Janice Steinberg UNION-TRIBUNE, April 17, 2006
„….If I were
king, I would try to place
those guiding the fortunes
of DRIFT under contract and
pay them generous salaries
as court jesters.
This is because their humour
is charged with sophisticated
intelligence, extreme sensibility
and irony while they are, at
the same time, being apparently
absolutely serious…
…What a pleasant surprise!
Their music is extremely enjoyable,
their singing is superb and
their electric songs sneak
into the ear, where they linger….From
now on the music making „Drifters“ have
become my musical favourites,
right after Yello!...
… The fast rhythm and
the movement of body parts
in unexpected sequences combine
to produce a vibrant dance.
These not only demonstrate
the virtuoso ability of Béatrice
Jaccard, but also the originality
of her thought – the
irregular aesthetic order that
reigns in her head.
… Special praise is
also due to Peter Schelling
who has created a wonderful
little opus revealing a post-dadaistic
clowning spirit and who is
also responsible for sound
and video.
EllenfÉny,
Lásló Rokas,
Budapest, May 2005
The
musicality of peanuts
and flower pots
“…When
scientists play electrifying
solos on air guitars,
a mixture of tomatoes
and peanuts starts to
sing and little people
seek shelter in a flower
pot, { one finds oneself
engulfed in the world
of the Drift Dance Company….emphatically
shrill and imaginative….”
Kronenzeitung, Austria, 19th
July 2005
"...Dances with sound effects...In "machine à
sons", Cie Drift gives priority to sound rather than sight,
at least on the face of things. In the guise of experimenters with
sound, Massimo Bertinelli, François Gendre and Béatrice
Jaccard, directed by Peter
Schelling, practice making
the noises of oranges and
fish, seize rhythms from
out of the air and sing melodies
that have apparently flown
up to them, while a video
screen shows them floating
on clouds and satirizing
the all-tech music business
in gesture and mime... Cie
Drift has gone down new paths
and does it masterfully,
with its own unique vision
and ear for the absurdity
of everyday life...“
Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Zurich,
Switzerland, December 18th, 2001
"...laugh-out-loud hilarious and endlessly inventive. Company
Drift‘s work blurred the borders between dance, theater and
music – and those between planned-to-the-last-detail performance
and a feeling of wacky spontaneity...sometimes deadpan and sometimes
with edgy intensity...a dazzling highlight..."
The San Diego Union Tribune, San
Diego, USA, May 18, 2002
Blurred borders festival expands
the mind...
„...in
sharp contrast was the ingenious
hilarity in the brilliant
work by the internationally
acclaimed trio from Zurich
Company Drift, using dance,
music, spoken word and multi-media,
giving the audience an Ernie
Kovacs look at our obsession
with analyzing EVERYTHING,
while masking the uncharted
territory of our own neuroses.
An evening of dance and
theater art to stay with
you a lifetime.“
San Diego Live, San Diego, USA, May
2002
“…This unusual piece, “Machine à sons”
– the Sound Machine – is a concert which also contains
dance sequences…..the Dance Company Cie Drift subtly and with
a strong sense of humour investigates the poetry of fringe conditions
and the absurdity of everyday life… and demonstrates how the
fantastic hides behind the bland. ”
Freiburger Nachrichten, Switzerland,
14th February 2003
„Haven’t you always believed that fish are mute, tomatoes
turn red silently, and that foot joints become audible only if they
are become arthritic?
It’s time that such opinions were corrected…in view
of the findings of the researchers, one should not be surprised
to find that pulsating rhythms and electronic sounds lie within
the bodies. Jaccard mutates from a stern typist to a hip-swinging
vamp, Bertinelli from a cool analyst to a hot-blooded percussionist,
Gendre from a well-behaved clerk to a snooty bassist…the imitation
of the body language of rock musicians is entrancingly presented…
turning still waters to torrential rivers...”
Aargauer Zeitung (Aargovian News),
Switzerland 21st February 2003
.”…wholeheartedly three eccentric researchers in green
gowns employ various methods of capturing sound. Thanks to stethoscopes
and headsets, lemons turn into noisy objects and incense proclaims
sacred music.
Nutmeg and dead fish are also examined as is the body itself.
Seeming to be in a condition of expanded consciousness, sounds appear
to increase in clarity and shrillness…with initially discreet
and restrained gestures, progressing to energetically orchestrated
break dance movements, disco steps and head bangs, the researchers
try to emulate the acoustic overstimulation.
The dance company Cie Drift convinces its audience with its curious
ideas and enchantingly bizarre and strongly expressed characters…and
takes its audience away to another, wondrous and sensuous world...
The enthusiasm of the performers is contagious and one is forced
into a fever of anticipation of what those sound experiments will
generate.”
Tages-Anzeiger, Zurich, Switzerland,
21st February 2003
„Cie Drift is one of the most striking phenomena in the free
Zurich dance scene... Operating at the level of surrealistic Dada
effects, the video sequences of Peter Schelling turn out to be full
of inspired wit.”
Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Switzerland,
21st February 2003
