On 13 January the Great Guild will host Jānis Šipkēvics’ major work – the musical performance for teenagers “Zenith”.
The composer wrote this song cycle in the summer of 2017 especially for the LNSO summer festival “LNSO Summer House”. The performance takes shape as an emotional and dynamic account by Jānis himself and his former classmate, the author of the cycle’s poetry Marts Pujāts, of what they lived through during their school years.
Two singing boys sketch out for the audience the classrooms and corridors of the Riga Cathedral Choir School in the 1990s, ride the lift, write dictations, play “Super Mario” and dream of new trainers.
Jānis Šipkēvics’ spellbinding music and Marts Pujāts’ witty poems awaken the child that lives on in each of us to the end of our days. The performance makes you smile, brings great joy and leaves behind the feeling of a vivid adventure.
Jānis Šipkēvics says: “This cycle is a peculiar psychological séance in which compositions in various genres restore the ties to the magical world of schooldays. Musically, the cycle is the kind a child would have written for his imaginary orchestra. With a wish to make sense of what is going on around him and to give it all a playful, existential, funny, moving, otherworldly and boyishly everyday meaning.”
The production is directed by Viesturs Meikšāns, with sets and costumes by Rūta Briede. The main characters will be played by Riga Cathedral Choir School pupilsHolgers ŠtālsandKristaps Apkalns, and joining them –the “LNSO Zenith Ensemble” under conductor Guntis Kuzma.
The programme has been prepared with the support of the State Culture Capital Foundation under the targeted programme “Creating content for the “Latvian School Bag””.
The song performance “Zenith” has been nominated for the “Kilogram of Culture” award in the category “Surprise of the Year”.
The musical performance for teenagers “Zenith” takes place on 13 January at 3 p.m. in the Great Guild.