The Up-river book

When I heard, that the steamboat "Roi des Belges” would strand on the rooftop of the Souhtbank Center, this was a perfect opportunity to work on Jospeh Conrad's "Up-river book" a notebook written in 1890 - while struggeling with this ship long time before writing "The Heart of Darkness". So I invited friends with whom I had already worked on his "Congo-Diary" 20 years ago on my music theatre production Ou bien le débarquement désastreux (Or the hapless landing): the two sengalesian Griots Sira and Boubakar Djebaté (voice and kora), the french musician Xavier Garcia (electronics) and the great actor André Wilms to build an acoustic image of that impossible travel.

"Mosquitos. Frogs. Beastly. Glad to see the end of this stupid tramp.
Feel rather seedy. Sun rose red. Very hot day. Wind South." Joseph Conrad, last entrance in his "Congo diary" before boarding the "roi des belges" on august 3rd 1890