O Mensch !

The exceptional nature oft some encounters throughout life go on to inspire the creation of artistic works that are truly worthy of them. One such work is « O Mensch ! », which was written when the composer Pascal Dusapin met the Austrian baritone singer Georg Nigl. It is a small and spontaneous chronicle of Nietzschen passion. It was when it was put to the test on stage, while he was writing the creation of two of his operas « Faustus », « The Last Night » (2006) and « Passion » (2008), that Pascal Dusapin took stock of the great talent of the singer Georg Nigl who had been an actor at the prestigious Burg Theatre in Vienna. Just as ease in the role of the character “obsessed by an impossible search for understanding” in one work as he was demonstrating the dismay “of a man damaged by a love which drove him to Hell’s door” in another, he seemed to Pascal Dusapin to be the ideal actor, with a talent broad enough to make any role his own. When Georg Nigl requested the Lieder Pascal Dusapin had the idea of developing a longer and more varied cycle of compositions based on Nietzsche poems.
The composer had dreamt of creating a work around Nietsche for a long time and consequently wrote 27 pieces, including 4 interludes for an unaccompanied piano which became « O Mensch ! » The production – which he has produced on stage himself- is the fruit of the mutual desire of these two artists to embark on a new adventure in collaborative work.