This month will be exciting. June brings the premiere of There in Düsseldorf and and a jazz service for grand piano and organ in Hamburg. Our Dialogue There by Etel Adnan together with actress Veronika Bachfischer has its premiere at the Freies Forum theatre in Düsseldorf. And in Hamburg I’m playing some of my compositions for organ and grand piano together with the organist Daniel Stickan as part of a jazz service at the Elbjazz Festival: „Bringing the festival to a close, the ELBJAZZ mass service in St. Katharinen presents Ulrike Haage (piano) and Daniel Stickan (organ). The two great keyboard instruments enter into a dialogue: in the mass service, at a time of war in Europe, concern about the planet, bewilderment in view of the great divide between the situation we’re in and how we’re responding. The Jazz Mass Service aims to counteract this: with music and humour, literature and prayer, doubt and the confidence that a belief in miracles always expresses more truth about the world than any empirically founded resignation.“ (Hauptkirche St. Katharinen)
„There is a prose poem by the Lebanese-American poet, philosopher and painter Etel Adnan (1925-2021). Written in 1997, during the war in Yugoslavia, it deals with conflicts between individuals, societies and the sexes: „If you have an enemy, and you are completely obsessed with him, this enemy will occupy your head. He becomes you. This is a difficult situation. There are victories in history that are worse than defeats.“ The musician and composer Ulrike Haage transforms Etel Adnan’s poem into an open musical-sound fabric in the back and forth of thinking and speaking, live „on, in and under“ the grand piano and in dialogue with the actress Veronika Bachfischer. In the context of the first comprehensive monographic exhibition of Etel Adnan’s work in Germany at the Kunstsammlung NRW.“ (Press text, Freies Forum Theatre Düsseldorf)