Dancer

Goldberg is a highly virtuosic and deeply poetic dance piece—inspired by a musical masterpiece: Johann Sebastian Bach's Goldberg Variations . To open his first season as director of the Hannover State Ballet, Goyo Montero's Goldberg, which premiered in Nuremberg in 2022 , not only brings an entire compendium of his dance art to the stage, but also a portrait of the fascinating personalities of his newly formed company, which, with this premiere, is presenting itself as an ensemble for the first time. We owe
the composition of the Goldberg Variations to the ailing Count Keyserlingk, who commissioned a cycle of variations from Bach as a remedy for his insomnia. What Bach then delivered, however, is anything but sleep music. Rather, the work, first published in 1741 simply as "Clavier-Übung," unfolds as an instrumental world theater. It is music that reflects the entirety of human life and, in Goldberg, becomes the starting point for dance variations on the theme of "dreams." Cheerful and profound, playful and powerful, formally rigorous and sensual, Goyo Montero uses the language of movement to penetrate the beauties and depths of the night. Carried by a composition by Canadian Owen Belton, who counterpoints and re-illuminates Bach's variations with his own soundscapes—live and electronic—Goyo Montero stages a play and counterplay of dreams and nightmares.

Dancer

McKenna Johnson

Events

Past events

Sep 25 - Nov 15, 2025

Goldberg · Staatstheater Hannover

About

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