Strings
A Triple Bill
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Playhouse, QPAC
Three daring visions — one unforgettable ballet
Experience three visionary works in one electrifying performance. As the title suggests, each work is grounded in string music, a sonic thread weaving through all three works to form a shared musical language.
- Edward Clug’s witty Chamber Minds explores human connection with striking patterns, playful imbalance, and ingenious staging via the use of a violin and cembalo.
- Christian Spuck’s The Seventh Blue is choreographed to Schubert’s Death and the Maiden string quartet and meditates on mortality through Schubert’s haunting Death and the Maiden.
- Goyo Montero’s Chacona pushes dancers to their limits against layered renditions of Bach’s Chaconne for solo violin.
With live music performed by Camerata - Queensland's Chamber Orchestra, these three ballets reveal dance as both urgent and eternal - shifting between intimacy, intensity, and collective resonance. A thrilling showcase of contemporary voices redefining ballet for today.
Image credit: Artists of Staatstheater Nürnberg Ballett. Photography Jesus Vallinas.
Venue
PLAYHOUSE - QPAC
Russell Street South Brisbane QLD 4101
Credits
Edward Clug
Choreographer - Chamber Minds
Christian Spuck
Choreographer & Set Designer - The Seventh Blue
Goyo Montero
Choreographer & Costume Designer - Chacona
Daniel Mulligan
Stager - Chamber Minds & The Seventh Blue
Ivan Gil-Ortega
Stager - Chacona
Marko Japelj
Set Designer - Chamber Minds
Leo Kulaš
Costume Designer - Chamber Minds
Miro Paternostro
Costume Designer - The Seventh Blue
Verena Hemmerlein
Costume Designer - Chacona
Michael Küster
Dramaturg - Chamber Minds
Martin Gebhardt
Lighting Designer - Chamber Minds & The Seventh Blue
Dino Strucken
Revival Lighting Designer - Chamber Minds & The Seventh Blue
Nicolas Fischtel
Revival Lighting Designer - Chacona
Camerata – Queensland's Chamber Orchestra
Music performed by
Milko Lazar
Music - Chamber Minds
Franz Schubert
Music - The Seventh Blue
György Kurtág
Music - The Seventh Blue
Dieter Fenchel
Music - The Seventh Blue
Johann Sebastian Bach
Music - Chacona
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#Performance Casting and Program
Performance Casting
Image Credit - Ballett Zürich performing The Seventh Blue. Photography by Gregory Batardon.
Program
Image Credit - Artists of Staatstheater Nürnberg Ballett. Photography by Jesus Vallinas.
#Chamber Minds
Edward Clug’s Chamber Minds brings subversive humour and inventive physicality to the stage, blending minimalist movement with intricate limb interlocking patterns and moments of playful imbalance.
Performed with razor sharp comedic timing, the piece celebrates the quirks of human behaviour through unexpected physical comedy, striking shapes and swift tonal shifts. Clug’s dancers tilt, teeter and wind themselves into surprising configurations, crafting a world where wit softens technical precision. Supported by clever stage design that enhances its visual mischief, Chamber Minds becomes both a charming satire of ballet’s traditions and a showcase of Clug’s ability to reveal beauty through eccentricity, rhythm and delight.
#The Seventh Blue
Christian Spuck’s The Seventh Blue (originally das siebte blau) draws its emotional spine from Schubert’s Death and the Maiden, interwoven with music by György Kurtág and atmospheric sound textures.
Spuck constructs a world of shared mortality using simple yet incisive movement, rapid fire tableaux and unison patterns that strip dancers of individual identity, emphasising the collective human condition. Scenes of lowering dancers into mist covered “grave like” spaces create a haunting meditation on fragility and the inevitability of death. With its stark imagery, breathless pacing and psychological charge, the work resonates as a powerful reflection on impermanence and the tension between life and loss.
#Chacona
Goyo Montero’s Chacona is a powerful, physically demanding work inspired by the emotional depth and structural unity of Bach’s Chaconne.
Built on a blend of classical technique and contemporary sensibility, the ballet drives dancers to the “tip of falling,” exploring off balance tension, weight and momentum with relentless intensity. Moving through contrasting musical worlds shaped by live violin, guitar and piano, the piece unfolds like a marathon—exhausting yet profoundly rewarding. Montero believes this extremity reveals honesty, presence and transformation, inviting audiences into a visceral journey that resonates long after the final note.
