Since 2021, the Genoveva-Gymnasium in Cologne Mühlheim has been working regularly with the Open Jazz House School (OJHS) to offer pupils the opportunity to develop creatively and musically. The Erlkönig Project, which was performed at Jazzweek, also shows how school, art and youth culture can go different ways at eye level. This musical piece with pupils from different years at the grammar school and lecturers from OJHS is a wild crossover of classical and contemporary music, an interdisciplinary and intercultural musical adventure that transforms Goethe’s famous Erlkönig ballad into a modern sound collage. Using their own lyrics and sounds, themes such as loss, being at the mercy of others, social media and empowerment are dealt with and staged as a gripping mix of rap, sound experiments, Persian drums, drama and visual elements – polyphonic, multilingual, full of energy and with their own perspectives on timeless poetry.
Schülerinnen und Schüler aus verschiedenen Klassenstufen des Genoveva-Gymnasiums Köln-Mülheim zusammen mit Dozierenden der Offenen Jazz Haus Schule:
Selina Weiss, Martin Morgenstern und Syavash Rastani.