Levinas: La Passion selon Marc - Une Passion après Auschwitz

‘The Passion according to Mark-A Passion after Auschwitz,’ premiered in April 2017. The project was commissioned to French composer Michaël Levinas by the Swiss association “Musique pour un temps présent”, as part of the events commemorating the 500th anniversary of Luther’s reform. This original oratorio is not only a reinterpretation or a mere revisitation of the Passion, it painfully faces, indeed, the irreconcilable nature of the Passion and the Holocaust. What is the object of this Passion after Auschwitz, which revolves around what can link two musical traditions, two religions that have been separated by barbarism. Which music, which tradition, which language can the composer use in order to express this double silence, both historical and theological, both human and divine? “After the Holocaust, is it possible to compose without crying and trembling?”, Michaël Levinas asks. It is not about anger or compassion. Because of the subtle polyphonies written for the chorus, the voices