Two Ensembles on the Edge of a Union

scored for clarinet, flute, trombone 

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duration 13 minutes 

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This theatrical performance explores the moment when the Western fantasy of the Ottoman world meets the lived musical reality of 18th-century Istanbul. What was once projected from afar slowly reveals its distance from the refined, inward-looking traditions it sought to evoke. 

The music moves between representation and presence. The alla turca gestures of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart stand alongside the genuine modal language of Ottoman court music. The figure of Giuseppe Donizetti, working at the court in Istanbul, embodies this threshold between worlds. The present listens to the past from both sides, aware that each hears the other through its own filters.

To choose one perspective exclusively would flatten the encounter. Instead, the performance lingers in the in-between. Newly arranged and composed music and improvisations by Lamekan Ensemble do not resolve the tension, but keep it alive. 

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Concept and Text: Mathias Coppens  

Actress: Elena Peeters 

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Two Ensembles at the Edge of A Union was commissioned by Euterpe and was first performed on December 12 2016 at Concert Studio Kortrijk (Belgium).