Dutch lutenist Jozef van Wissem premieres in Warsaw the score he’s composed for Fritz Lang’s silent film “Destiny”.

Tomorrow, Wednesday, a live premiere of the score composed by Dutch lutenist Jozef van Wissem for Fritz Lang’s silent film Destiny (Der müde Tod,in German, is its original title), originally released in 1921, will take place at the Muranów cinema in Warsaw. Van Wissem will perform his work while the film, one of the gems of German expressionism, is being screened, just as he did on 9 October 2019 for F. W. Murnau’s silent film Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror, commissioned by La Cinémathèque Française.

A day after the premiere in Warsaw, Van Wissem will repeat the experience at the Nowe Horyzonty cinema in Wroclaw, also in Poland. The Dutch composer, lutenist and guitarist, known for his collaborations with Jim Jarmusch, creates a timeless, dark and intense universe of hypnotic minimalism, perfectly suited to the story described in the film, in which a young woman confronts Death to beg him to bring her deceased lover back to life. Death imposes a condition on her which she must fulfil if she is to be reunited with her beloved. He tells her three stories: The Oriental Parable, The Venetian Parable and The Chinese Parable, and promises to grant the heroine’s wish if she manages to save the life of at least one character in the stories. Divided into six chapters, the film begins with the one entitled Story of the First Light. As the action takes place in different corners of the world, the music can travel with it, creating its own story and the compositions will follow the music of the regions depicted in the film. Along the way, the folk music will be modernised with contemporary electronic treatments hidden behind the frames of the film.