Sensorial Symphonies

Commissioned by Théâtres de la Ville de Luxembourg

Premiere – 27, 28, 30/09/2025 and 02/10/2025, Grand Théâtre de la Ville de Luxembourg

ABOUT IN CONVERSATION WITH ELISABETH FRAMING PROGRAM PHOTOS & VIDEOS TEAM

Dossiers

ENGLISH

DEUTSCH

FRANÇAIS

‚Nature is chaos in motion. Biological life is a spiral diffusion of possibilities, fractal in its abundance. Every organism, and certainly every plant, comes from an evolutionary net- work of green leafy things, only to give rise to further variations. They all change their form, of course, because all this never ends – except when plants die out. The diversity seemed endless and impossible to grasp.’

– Zoë Schlanger –

ABOUT

What if we could feel the world as plants do?

In Sensorial Symphonies, Associate Artist of Les Théâtres de la Ville de Luxembourg, Elisabeth Schilling embarks on a radical experiment, reshaping our perception of existence itself. Set against the backdrop of Sergei Rachmaninov’s iconic Piano Concerto No. 2—reimagined and interwoven with a contemporary score by Pas- cal Schumacher and the organic sounds of The Plant Philharmonic—this creation is as ambitious in scope as it is intricate in execution.

Sensorial Symphonies invites the audience into an immersive, multi-sensory journey, where plants are not mere decorative metaphors but active protagonists, taking centre stage with their elaborate, interconnected systems. The choreography honours the wisdom of plant life, its symbiotic relationships, resilience, and boundless adaptability, asking us to reconsider our place in a shared ecological web.

The piece transcends human-centric narratives, celebrating plants as both subjects and collaborators. Through touch, scent, design, sound and movement, it encourages us to not only see but also feel vegetal life, challenging Aristotle’s legacy relegating plants to the lowest rung of being. This is a politics of perception, a push to elevate the status of the natural world in our collective consciousness.

Musically, the work is equally groundbreaking. Schumacher’s score blends Rachmaninov’s un- mistakable emotional depth with the minimalist, organic tones of plant-generated sound. The intersection of these seemingly opposing forces—Rachmaninov’s sweeping romanticism and the subtle, non-human frequencies of The Plant Philharmonic—creates a sonic landscape as layered and complex as the ecosystems it seeks to evoke. The contrast is deliberate, compelling us to rethink what virtuosity means: the mastery of human artistry versus the understated yet exqui- site expression of plant life.

Performed by an all-female cast, the choreography mirrors the vegetal world’s relational, non-hierarchical structures. Dancers move with a fluidity that reflects the distributed organisation of plants, forming patterns of mutuality and reciprocity. Group sequences unfold like eco- systems, interdependent, dynamic, and teeming with unseen forces.

Yet, Sensorial Symphonies does not shy away from the contradictions it explores. The theatre—a human-made space—contrasts starkly with nature’s untamed vitality. Elisabeth Schilling’s work embraces this tension, examining how the slow, expansive temporality of plants can find expression within the urgency of live performance. How can nature’s boundlessness be contained within the confines of a theatre? These questions, embedded into the fabric of the work, invite us to confront our own separation from the natural world.

Through its rich interplay of music, movement, and sensory design, Sensorial Symphonies resists easy interpretation, insisting instead on an experiential, almost tactile engagement with its themes. In Elisabeth Schilling’s hands, dance becomes nature’s exuberant music – an inquiry, a transformation, a way of perceiving the world anew. This is not just a profound performance; it is an act of reclamation.

IN CONVERSATION WITH ELISABETH

– How might we conceive of the bond between dance and music? –

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No other art forms are as profoundly linked as dance and music. Just as today, no bond between art forms is as studied and analysed from all sides as the coexistence, interconnectedness — one might even call it intertwining — of dance and music. I am aware I am generalizing a lot, but very broadly speaking, back in the day, ballet’s role was that of a supportive act for the music. Dance in the neoclassical period imitated

music by retracing its lines and sculpting it through the dancers’ bodies.

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– Where do you situate your work in relation to this idea? –

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I’m not trying to reiterate through dance what the music is doing, because I don’t conceive of dance as a mere crutch for music, quite the opposite. Their bond, which I conceive of as a many-layered interdependence, is one I approach from several angles: scientific as well as emotional, textural as well as rhythmic. In these varied ways, what I

seek are sparks of inspiration which will lead to movement.

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When I created my first group project in 2020, HEAR EYES MOVE. Dances with Ligeti (a choreographic interpretation of Györgi Ligeti’s 18 etudes for piano), I was seeking inspiration in the rhythmic structures found in the realms of physics and mathematics—as did Ligeti himself. At the same time, I was looking to develop my own identity in and through dance, so as not to simply imitate what the music was doing—an identity on equal footing with the musical score, independent yet also interdependent, based on an intricate and delicate language of movement. You might say I emulated Ligeti’s compositional method through dance, allowing things to magnetise and converge, to be drawn to one another, leaning on network theory, chaos theory, complex systems, and actions and consequences.

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– Can dance and choreography be perceived at a more abstract level? –

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In my work, I differentiate between two phases. First, there is my scientific research, for which I read musical scores, analysing compositions, rhythmic structures and melodies, but I also learn about the composer’s life and sources of inspiration, which inform my own

process. Then, there is the more abstract side of dance and choreography, attained through a wordless kind of language. I try to conceive of music through a kind of emotional, choreographic hearing, based on personal, creative association. I hear textures and allow images to come to mind, and all of a sudden I see things: a tree swaying in the wind, someone taking flight through an open window.

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So I try to bring the dancers together, in order to make them react to images or associations drawn from nature. I ask them to think of their bodies as a reflection on the water, or leaves in the wind, or a dried-up sunflower field, leaving behind their human bodies to instead become elements.

⠀– This is a choreographic concept you’ve developed in a previous project, Florescence in Decay. –

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I created Florescence in Decay in 2022, based on music by the contemporary composer Anna Meredith. Conceived for nine dancers, this work deepened my choreographic investigation into the relationship between music and dance, a relationship which, in working closely with the musical composition, I came to understand as a highly detailed, complex and interdependent one.

In this piece, I explored themes such a cyclicality, natural metamorphosis, our concept of the solar year. It’s a piece that evokes the world of plants from a cosmological perspective, focusing on our intrinsic bond with the natural world of which we humans are a part, and from which we cannot be separated entirely. I envisaged something like

zooming out, a big-picture concept of our relationship with living things. I wanted to dance a growing and blooming flower, which is then eaten by a cow, then digested.

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On stage, ever since HEAR EYES MOVE, I’ve tried to render this as the relationship between bodies which, though not physically touching, are nevertheless expressing through dance the potential effects they have on one another. If one of them turns around, the others turn with it. Dancing in canon, so to speak, rather than in unison: the same movements overlapping, linked in sequence, action and consequence. Ever gesture impacts the system as a whole. It’s become an important stylistic device in my work.

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– You’re currently working on a new project using Rachmaninov’s music, but that project goes even further. –

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I’ve fallen in love with Rachmaninov’s music, even if it’s sometimes considered to be kitsch. I love the brilliance of his virtuosity, though it’s precisely this virtuosity that makes

Rachmaninov’s work a challenging one to transform into choreography. I find that in contemporary dance we are rather too afraid of strong emotions, too unwilling to face them. Then again, I was really keen to tackle a great composer. I read and listen to a lot of music, and after nursing this desire for a long time I’ve now finally plucked up the

courage to use Rachmaninov’s music to further my research on the interrelatedness of rhythm, textures, and the world of plants.

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But, indeed, I’d like to take things further. For this project, I intend to combine the piano concerto n.2 in C minor with a newly commissioned piece by the contemporary sound artist and musician Alexandra Duvekot. Fascinated by plants’ capacity to produce actual sounds, which can be amplified, Duvekot has worked with plant sounds since 2012. In

combining two seeming opposites, we aim to root Rachmaninov’s three-part piano concerto in and around Duvekot’s contemporary composition for plant sounds, thus uniting the polyphonic nature sounds with the virtuosity of the solo concerto, creating an aesthetic contrast between the contemporary and a Western classic. Likewise, in Rachmaninov’s work, the entire concerto seems to germinate from the seed of three

notes, from which the entire melody grows in an organic, plantlike way.

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For me, it’s a matter of creating a truly emotional event, something as intense, overflowing and fierce as nature itself, with its scents and shapes, its darkness and incredible beauty. Instead of separating art (and culture) from nature, I combine their parallel characteristics, putting dance on equal footing with the philosophical study of plant life. When we walk in the woods, we can feel the the energy emitted by plants and

trees, and I want dance to emit the same kind of energy—a dance conveying the sensation of tree bark. I envisage choreographic sequences, which take on the appearance of plants, bringing to the stage the sensorial oneness of nature.

PHOTOS & VIDEOS

Get an insight into the choreographic and compositional vision of Sensorial Symphonies!

TEAM

For further biographical information on all our Team Members, including the Plant Philharmonic, please click HERE

Concept – Elisabeth Schilling in collaboration with the team

Choreography – Elisabeth Schilling

Dance – Manuela Hierl, Marla King, Noa Nies, Aurore Mettray, Marine Tournet
All movements are created together with the dancers

Choreographic Assistant & Rehearsal Director – Brian Ca

Costumes & Stage Design – Agnes Hamvas

Musical Concept & Original Composition – Pascal Schumacher rooted in a De- and Reconstruction of Sergei Rachmaninov’s 2nd Piano Concerto integrating elements of The Plant Philharmonic

The Plant Philharmonic – Dogwood bush (Cornus), Pando Forest – Beneath the Tree (Populus tremuloides), Japanese Eelgrass (Zostera japonica), Eelgrass (Zostera), Pando Collage, Scotch Broom (Cytisus scoparius),Apple Tree (Malus domestica), Ginkgo Tree (Ginkgo biloba), Pine Tree (Pinus), Weeping Willow (Salix babylonica), Sequoia (Sequoia sempervirens), Linden Tree (Tilia), Horse Chestnut (Aesculus hippocastanum), Platane Tree (Platanus), Beech (Fagus), Den (Pinaceae), Mexican Jumping Bean, Icelandic Birch (Betula pubescens), Tomato Plant (Solanum lycopersicum), French Beech (Fagus sylvatica), Eucalyptos (Eucalyptus), Fig (Ficus), Larches (Larix), Oak (Quercus), Scotspine (Pinus sylvestris), Sedge Roots (Carex), Teasel (Dipsacus)

Communities, interactions and communication in ecosystems (P1-0255) and Ecotremology ( Z1-50018) financed by Sloevian Research and innovation Agency.

Recorded by – Alexandra Duvekot, Jez riley French, Jeff Rize, Rok Šturm (National Institute of Biology, Slovenia), Hidden Sound.

Recording 2nd Piano Concerto – Daniil Trivonov, Philadelphia Orchestra, Yannick Nézet-Séguin

Scent Artist – Ezra-Lloyd Jackson

Lighting Design – Fränz Meyers

Sound Installation The forest still sings for us – Alexandra Duvekot

Live Music – United Instruments of Lucilin

Dramaturgy & Leadership Coach – Eva Martinez

Sound Designer – tbc

Texts on the piece – Neel Chrillesen

Accompanying Philosopher – Héctor Andrés Peña

Photography & videography – Bohumil Kostohryz

Accompanying Musicologiests – Jean-François Boukobza (CNDSM Paris), Steffen A. Schmidt (ZHdK Zürich)

Producers – Joëlle Träuffler, Antoine Krieps, Jon Roberts, Clara Berrod and Susan Hay

Management Pascal Schumacher – Executive Music Producer Rafael Junker, Monday NightProductions

Head of Technique – Patrick Floener

Press and Website – Tyska Samborska

International Relations – Marie Simplex

The framing program was created together with Manon Meier.

Elisabeth Schilling’s research on vegetality has been informed by books of Michael Marder, Stephano Mancuso, Emmanuele Coccia, Wolf-DieterStorl, Monica Gagliano, Zoë Schlanger, amonst others.

Commissioned by – Theatre de la Ville de Luxembourg

Co-produced by – Elisabeth Schilling & Company & United Instruments of Lucilin

Supported by SACEM Luxembourg, Minister de la Culture Luxembourg, TROIS C-L | Maison pour la danse

Residences – Karukera Ballet Guadeloupe & RedSapata Art, Culture and Dance Initiative