(Flying nonsense)
This performance is a score for two voices written and performed by actor and stage director Dieudonné Niangouna, together with accordionist Pascal Contet.
Once upon a time there was a civil war, among so many others, as terrifying and destructive as all the others. It was in 1997 in Congo-Brazzaville. It lasted a few years, almost three. Dieudonné Niangouna experienced it in his flesh and spirit. Today, he can finally deliver a text on this subject, a text which he has long held hidden, convinced that all the survivors could only be cowards as they did not die as heroes.
A journey to hell that Dieudonné Niangouna shares with Pascal Contet, an outstanding figure in contemporary music, capable of turning his accordion into a full-fledged character who accompanies the screams and the murmurs, and becomes a partner in suffering. It is a genuine dialogue that emerges between the two interpreters and their instruments: the voice of one, the music of the other. We are in the theatre and not in a documentary narrative, thus the required distance is established to present what is at the heart of a reconstruction work through the survival of memory.
text, direction and interpretation: Dieudonné Niangouna
music and interpretation: Pascal Contet
lighting: Xavier Lazarini et Brunel Makoumbou
sound design: Christina Clar
production: Avignon Festival
delegated production: Bonlieu Scène nationale Annecy; coproduction: Festival d’Avignon, l’Allan Scène nationale de Montbéliard, Châteauvallon Centre national de Création et de Diffusion culturelles, Théâtre 71 Scène nationale de Malakoff, Théâtre d’Arras
Avignon Festival, 2009
