Wondrous machines carry on with a ghostly existence; supply structure and atmosphere, create sounds. Grand piano and viola produce the basic musical backdrop which is artfully augmented through tape isertions and similar alienation. Quiet, melancholic city blues, baroque allegretto multi-layered sound combinations join in agreeable, rhythmic diaphonics.

Music, dance and machines are the three elements which join in this inspired and humorous dance performance to an enigmatic entity.

Two men: a romantic prince in a white, tight-fitting garment wearing a fluttering shirt, and a daredevil type with malicious intentions, appear from the rubble of white columned ruins and slink around a graceful young woman. The dancers coordinated harmony switches from lost solitude to frenzied duels, while the woman, dancing like a true ballerina, seeks the ultimate danger by cheekily putting her balance at risk. The tenderness of hands touching cheeks, the erotically-loaded provocation of an estranged exhibition dance, aggressions and jealously, the dancers overflowing exuberance over their gravity-defying weight-lessness overshadows the always present moments of jaded ambiguity.

Three white staffs, the hands of a crazy clock, turn. The woman steals her staff with and it, propels herself out of impermanence. For many years, Werner Stiefel danced solo at the Oper Leipzig and since 1990 he’s a member of Schauspiel Leipzig’s dance company. Stiefel is one of the very few choreographers in the new provinces of the reunited Germany who creates full evening productions. He gathers for his productions prodigious dancers and musicians while Erwin Stache, an unique avant-gardist, creates additional art acoustic and optical pleasures by means of innovative sound machines.