The Deutsche Oper Berlin presents a crossover concert to open its new season: German symphonic music rubs shoulders with Yiddish klezmer while recent reports by women who have made the trek to Europe are set in juxtaposition to our understanding of Beethoven as a proponent of global humanism. An evening in which symphony concert meets klezmer session. A blend of dance, documentary theatre and video installation featuring the orchestra of the Deutsche Oper Berlin, klezmer composer Yom and other guests under the baton of General Music Director Donald Runnicles.

BABY DOLL is a symphonic project commissioned by seven French orchestras to mark Beethoven’s anniversary year, 2020. Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 in A major was the stimulus for this work by Paris filmmaker and director Marie-Eve Signeyrole, who recently attracted attention in Germany for being nominated for the FAUST Prize in 2019. The end product is a concert with staged scenes depicting two very different cultures coming into contact with one another. Beethoven’s 7th Symphony – a key work in the European musical canon – comes up against the real-life stories of women on the move in the midst of the current migration crisis, their destinies finding onstage expression in textual form and in the dancing of two female performers. The women tell of violence experienced as they made their way to Europe and describe their desperate attempts to avoid violation by using baby dolls under their clothing to feign pregnancy or motherhood. BABY DOLL is also a cross-cultural work in musical terms: Beethoven’s symphonic “apotheosis of dance” (the unofficial subheading of his 7th) meets klezmer pieces written by French clarinettist Yom, who is a regular and enthusiastic mixer and matcher of genres.