[TR24][OF] Flying Steps - Flying Pictures at an Exhibition - 2019 (Modern Creative, Third Stream)

Olga Scheps, piano
Rahel Senn, piano
Berlin Music Ensemble
Flying Steps

Inspired by this work written 150 years ago, the composer brothers Vivan and Ketan Bhatti took Mussorgsky's score and rescripted it in a new composition.
The idea of combining urban dance and classical music in a museum had already been done by Flying Steps back in 2010, as they premiered their production Flying Bach in Berlin's Neue Nationalgalerie, a museum designed by modernist architect Mies van der Rohe.
Early hip hop dancers in the Bronx in the 1970s typically had a boombox in the background. Berlin's Flying Steps are accompanied by a live music orchestra, the Berlin Music Ensemble.
To create the music, the Bhatti brothers did not simply add an electronic beat to Mussorgsky's composition. Vivan Bhatti described the creative process as "superscription," comparing it to the palimpsest, through which a manuscript page was scraped to be reused for another document. "The original shines through these new notes being played by a music orchestra," the composer explained.
For the beats, the composers were inspired by the techniques developed by 20th century avant-garde musicians, through which the Bhattis applied unusual ways of playing the tuba to serve as the bass drum, or a loop of a plucked violin string to create another layer of rhythm.
The composers' "avant-garde" inspiration shouldn't give the wrong impression. This is a crowd-pleasing production designed to draw an audience of all ages. Since music, dance and street art have no language barriers, the Flying Steps' latest show directed by Vartan Bassil is also destined to open more international doors.
And along the way, Flying Pictures will certainly contribute to introducing the older generation to urban art, and the young one to the works of Russian composer Mussorgsky. Who wouldn't agree with that picture?