Last Friday, the new production of Cabaret<\/em> premiered at the Residenztheater Munich. I was responsible for the sound compositions. By that I mean the sound in the moments between the songs \u2014 the material that connects the numbers without becoming a song itself.<\/p>\n For these in-between spaces, director Claus Guth introduced a term I find very accurate: \u201cguided silence.\u201d A sonic layer that keeps the ear alert and receptive, preparing the next song without anticipating it.<\/p>\n The production is set in a modest hotel in an American city in the 1980s. This comes with a naturalistic sound layer: the city outside, the building itself, dripping pipes, distant noises. Running alongside this, almost constantly, is a musical layer \u2014 sustained chords, isolated tones, minimal tensions. Music that does not want to be music, but still carries the scene.<\/p>\n The work constantly moves between music and non-music, between atmosphere and structure. What the audience experiences as subtle is, in practice, highly detailed work. These backgrounds are often assumed to be easy. They are not. When they don\u2019t fit, when something is off, you notice immediately \u2013 and then they do more harm than good.<\/p>\n Quiet does not automatically mean simple. And this precise work in the background was my task for this production.<\/p>\n