As part of this year’s Malta International Arts Festival, Zonzo Compagnie is bringing its award-winning children’s performance about the musical language of Italian avant-garde composer Luciano Berio to Malta. Adam Brimmer interviews the creative team behind the event

The production tackles different musicians and composers and makes them accessible to a young audience – how was the concept for this born?

The goal of Zonzo Compagnie is to make the diversity of the non-commercial music landscape accesible for young audiences. We do this in a non-educational way and start from the art form itself. Zonzo Compagnie developed the Big Bang festival, which is an adventures music festival for young audiences that takes place in 13 cities in Europe and one in Canada.

Alongside this festival, we create our own shows. In the endless range of possibilities, we had to limit ourselves to certain formats for the productions we wanted to create, such as the composer portraits. These are music theatre performances with an iconic musician or composer as their starting point. We started with John Cage but, meanwhile, we created performances about Miles Davis, Luciano Berio, Thelonious Monk and Johann Sebastian Bach.

What is the idea behind it?

The idea behind each composer portrait is always the same. We take the artistic universe and personality of a composer as starting point for a performance. The result is a scattered mirror, a totally subjective portrait of a composer designed by the creative team of each project. For John Cage, we worked with two seperate rooms – one as an experimental space, a lab full with objects; the other as a ritual place, a small concert hall with a grand piano. Both aspects of Cage, the precise composer and the experimental approach on the other hand were seperated in these rooms. During the performance, the boundaries between them disappeared.

Is it only children who will enjoy it?

It is said that our approach takes children seriously and makes adults more playful. We see our audiences as equal, not as people who need to be educated. And not as a future audience. They are real, and here and now. We avoid taking a childish approach, which means that adults can also enjoy it. And there are no ‘second-class’ musicians, but the absolute best. In fact, BerBerio is performed by Revue Blanche, a high-level classical music ensemble.

How were the John Cage and Miles Davis performances received?

Listen to the Silence: a Journey with John Cage, won many international awards as best and most innovative music performance for children. Mile(s)tones has been touring for many years and has had over 200 shows. For those who wondered whether jazz or contemporary music is only suitable for children, we proved the opposite.

What made you opt for Berio this time round?

There were many reasons, but I guess the most important one was his ever-changing approach to music, with the composer looking at it from very different angels. But, of course, we were also captivated by the variety of the music itself, from the folk songs to the unique sequenzas. Stripsody, a composition by his muse and wife Cathy Berberian, is also part of the performance.

What happens on stage? Can you walk us through how the production works?

The performance is a journey through the work of Berio and Berberian. From a visual point-of-view, stage director Letizia Renzini chose a specific video setup that enables us to play with perspectives. Like Berio plays with the perspectives on music, we translate this visually. The four musicians play with these boundaries while excellently executing the music of Berio and Cathy Berberian, from a moving folk song to the hilarious Stripsody and a mad synfonia.

What makes this production different from what audiences are usually used to?

I don’t know what audiences are used to, but it could be the lack of a linear narration. We mostly don’t use language in our performances but let the music and the theatrical context we create around the music speak for itself. We don’t explain things, we take you with us for a unique experience.

What were the biggest challenges translating it from concept to reality?

The fact there is no manual for these kind of productions, because nobody did it before. Finding the right combination between all elements is the biggest challenge, starting with the right team, stage director, musicians, costume designer, technical crew, and so on. Without any doubt they did a great job translating the world of Berio to a powerful performance, accesible to young audiences and enjoyable to adults as well.

Berberio takes place today at the Valletta Campus Theatre (ex-MITP), St Christopher Street, Valletta at 6pm. Tickets are available online.

www.kultura.mt/en/events/berberio-Mzky