photo: Jürgen Weser

Radio play for voice and trombone based on the children’s book by Lewis Carroll, in German.

“Lewis Carroll’s novel about the extraordinary experiences of Alice [...] belongs - in numerous adaptations and media – to one of the original classics of children’s literature [...] The text here - based on a more modern, coherently revised and abridged translation – is staged as a dialogue for voice and trombone. The well-known stage and TV actress Walfriede Schmitt convincingly uses her voice to characterize Alice as well as the bizarre animals and mythical creatures [...] The production is lent a specific quality through Conny Bauer’s trombone playing [...] Bauer uses his playing in some passage to accentuate the text; for example when the narrator describes a hot summer day, her words are underlain by broad, tired, sleepy tones that increase in tempo when the rabbit appears, scampering by. But for the most part the trombone translates Alice’s actions and encounters in short solos, characterizing moods, creating atmospheres. The trombone takes on the function of a narrative voice, exaggerating and distorting them into the surreal, although also creating breathing spaces, allowing excursions into harmonious idylls [...] Bauer and Schmitt offer here discerning acoustic art, [...] for art lovers great and small.”
Katja Straub, Hochschule der Medien Stuttgart (HdM), 2008

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“An ideal coupling converges upon ‘the world’s smallest theatre’.”
05.10.2002, Ingrid Ehrhardt, Freies Wort, Suhl

Walfriede Schmitt

Walfriede Schmitt (born 1943 in Berlin) is a well-known German TV and theatre actress. Between 1972 and 1994 she was a member of the cast of the Volksbühne in Berlin. Her roles include parts in the TV films Das Schilfrohr, Bahnwärter Thiel, Pauline Oswalds zweites Leben, Coming Out, Die Beunruhigung, the DEFA children’s film Moritz in der Litfaßsäule and TV series such as Für alle Fälle Stefanie and Der Landarzt. Walfriede Schmitt has worked with amongst others Brigitte Soubeyrand, Horst Bonnet, Benno Besson, Fritz Marquardt, Heiner Müller, Matthias Langhoff, Frank Castorff, Christoph Schlingensief and Hans Kresnik and has also directed. As a freelancer, she is also involved with projects involving texts from author Joachim Ringelnatz as well as Love and Blues and Alice im Wunderland. Schmitt received the prize for best supporting role in the film Die Beunruhigung, as well as receiving the GDR’s art prize and acting prizes, the latter several times.

Conny Bauer

Conny Bauer (born 1943 in Halle an der Saale), is one of Europe’s most significant trombonists. Since the start of the 70’s he has been a founding member of numerous groups such as Exis, FEZ, Konrad Bauer Quartet, Bauer Sommer Kowald Trio, Doppelmoppel, Zentralquartett as well as the initiator of the big band Klangprojekt 86 (which later became the Jazzorchester der DDR).
Bauer gave his debut solo trombone concert in 1974. Today, over 35 years later he continues to explore and experiment with this instrument, continually developing new worlds of sound for himself and his audiences.

“Bauer is able to do what no-one else can: he expresses… excitement, fear, boredom, sadness, consternation, happiness, harmony, freedom, a rabbit scampering as well as the leisureliness of the caterpillar…”
05.10.2002, Ingrid Ehrhardt, Freies Wort, Suhl

CD- Production

……“Alice im Wunderland”

2000, Conny Bauer (Posaune & Stimme “Das weiße Kaninchen”), Wallfriede Schmitt (Stimmen)