Worte und Töne

Literature, music and dramatic art are the elements of Words and Sounds. The first evening in this series is dedicated to Anne Weber, one of the acclaimed Franco-German contemporary female authors. The actress Maria Köstlinger reads from the text with accompanying jazz music by Riedler | Oberkanins | Raab.

The famous suburbs of Paris, the banlieues, are the topic of the most recent book by Anne Weber: Suburbs (Bannmeilen). It never occurred to her, like many others, to cross the border between the city and suburb, until a friend suggested that she accompany her for a film project into these banlieues, which underwent far-reaching change before the Olympic Summer Games 2024.

She describes what she discovered there: the network of rail tracks, highways and motorways, where warehouses, gigantic hypermarkets, construction sites and millions of people are jammed in. She discovers the Muslim cemetery of Bobigny surrounded by scrap heaps; or the two circular social housing estates of Noisy-le-Grand with their microcosm of urban life. Anne Weber senses thousands of places with stories to tell of colonialism and suffering, of hope and progress.

In cooperation with the Festival Glatt&Verkehrt and the Institut français d’Autriche.

***BIOGRAPHIES***

Anne Weber
b. 1964, is a German author and translator who lives in Paris. She writes her books in German and French. She has won numerous awards, including the Heimito von Doderer Prize and the German Book Prize in 2020. In 2024 she earned the accolade of the Solothurn Literature Prize and received the Joseph Breitbach Prize for her outstanding collected works. Recently published: Bannmeilen (Suburbs), 2024.

Anne Weber is a magnificent storyteller who constantly searches for new forms for new themes, whose prose is often close to poetry for its expressiveness and wonderful imagery.
Cornelia Geißler, Berliner Zeitung

Maria Köstlinger
b. 1972, is an Austrian actress. She was awarded the honour of Kammerschauspielerin in 2017 and belongs to the ensemble of the Theatre in Josefstadt in Vienna. Besides her theatre work she also plays active roles in film- and television productions like Tatort or Vorstadtweiber.

Trio Riedler, Oberkanins, Raab
The trio of saxophonist Ilse Riedler, trumpeter Lorenz Raab and percussionist Ingrid Oberkanins is characterized by precise interplay, a playful approach to the formal language of jazz and the exploration of the sound possibilities of their instruments.

Jazz is probably an umbrella term for their music, but it conceals all kinds of exciting connections. Free phases meet through-composed passages, seemingly classical themes meet hard-driving rhythms or finely chiseled melodies.

Ilse Riedler – Saxophone, bass clarinet
Lorenz Raab – Trumpet, flugelhorn, mellophone
Ingrid Oberkanins – Percussion, marimba, hang