Berlin, Sonnenallee (Photo: Anne Inken Bickert)
It’s a wet, grey day in September.
Street noise from Sonnenallee seeps through the gap in an open window. Building work. Sirens.
It’s nine o’clock in the morning when I start work.
In front of me, my laptop.
The perpetual clacking of the computer keyboard gives my work a rhythm. E-mails flood my inbox.
A message from Gelsenkirchen.
A message from Darmstadt.
Replies to messages from the day before yesterday.
Ping!
DM from the RHO collective. Question as to whether further expenditure on steel can be made.
Roland calls. We discuss the current status of the project.
Lunch.
Back at the laptop.
The demo tape of the first act is playing in the background.
GDR nostalgia and noise mix in my room to create a strangely beautiful tapestry of sound.
Money flows from one account to another and rushes as an invisible shadow across national borders to our composer.
More emails. More phone calls.
In the evening, a Zoom call with the collective.
Microphones crackle, the connection is poor, bottle caps are opened.
Hissing.
The call takes longer than expected again and everyone is talking in confusion.
A polyphony of different voices emerges.
A bit like an opera.
