La passion d’Enkidu (Gilgamesh Epic)

LA PASSION D’ENKIDU (Gilgamesh epic)
opera for 8 instrumentalists, electronics and video
by Zad Moultaka

Whether in the epic of Gilgamesh or a little later in the tablets of Hammurabi, or in the ancient Greek theater, especially that of Aeschylus, we can be struck by the economy and efficiency that under – extend the deployment of these ancient writings, as well as this energy capable of plunging us in a direct and unadorned way into the abyssal depths of our consciences. A form of austerity could emerge from these primordial texts, I see rather a great existential urgency, a “go to goal” without detours, towards the question of life and death.

Other resonances, other inspirations, such as Giotto’s figures, so imbued with simplicity and humanity, far from the flourishes and seduction in which Western art sometimes stumbles. Standing beings, who speak to us with the strength that silence brings.

Here, speech and song are not conveyed by the human voice; characters are speech – and vice versa. Reading the words of Gilgamesh or Enkidu, their words echo in us and become the words of our inner heroes. Their questions, their arrogance, their fears, thus find echoes deep inside of us … in silence.

The musicians, around the device, are our mirror, the extension of our body, an ancient, archaic sound material, with modern instruments and other survivors of the night of time, accompanying and enveloping the silence of this word, becoming its own flesh. Their silhouettes are extended by a video device on a wall invisible to them, transforming their shadow into strange and autonomous presences, shadows that, doomed to invade the theatrical space, revealing sculptural objects scattered in the scenic space, are the reflections fragmented memory. 

Such was Gilgamesh 
Perfect, dazzling!
He who opened 
The passes of the mountains
Creusa wells
On the neck of the mountains 
Passed the Huge Sea
Until where the Sun sleeps 
And explored the whole universe 
In search of sight (-not end)

The epic of Gilgamesh, a story composed of twelve tablets written in Akkadian, is one of the oldest texts of humanity. The hero, king of the city of Uruk, guided by his only excess, attracts the wrath of the goddess Aruru who models in clay his double antagonistic, Enkidu, sent to moderate his excesses. Destined to be rivals, Gilgamesh and Enkidu bind themselves to an unfailing friendship. Gilgamesh, animated by a vibrant desire for glory and immortality, leads Enkidu into one of daring adventures, a perilous journey at the end of which Enkidu will die.

Immersed in the most desperate desperation, Gilgamesh invents the ritual of funerals before setting off again in search of the flower of immortality at the ends of the world and hell – quest at the end of which he will be forced to accept its perfectible nature and finiteness.

The epic of Gilgamesh has been patinated by centuries. No one knows the true origin, assumptions and dreams are many. Copies, translations, rewrites, repetition, errors, accidents and time have worked.

Viola da gamba, lyra, ney, kanun, santur … Mediterranean instruments mingle with the sounds of baroque instruments. Alchemy worked in Greece and France during three experimental residencies for research in the depths of living tradition and creation.

Zad Moultaka, conductor

Sokratis Sinopoulos, lyra
Evgenios Voulgaris, yali tanbur
Harris Lambrakis, ney
Stefanos Dorbarakis, kanun, Vangelis Pashalidis santuri
Claudio Bettinelli, percussions
Andreas Linos & Christine Plubeau violes da gamba

Ensemble Mezwej

co-production Mezwej • Onassis Cultural Center • Arsenal de Metz • DRAC Provence-Alpes Côte d’Azur

opera for 8 instrumentalists, electronics and video

November 30, 2018 Premiere, L’Arsenal de Metz, France
April 6, 2019 Le Lieu unique, Nantes, France
April 8, 2019 Théâtre Jean Vilar, Vitry, France
April 19 & 20, 2019 Centre Culturel Onassis, Athens, Greece