It is big news in the early music community: The 12 fantasias for viola da gamba solo, written in 1735 by the celebrated baroque composer Georg Philipp Telemann, emerged in a German archive, after having been lost for 250 years. This documentary tracks back the history of these pieces and tells the story of their disappearance, but above all shows how contemporary gamba players from different cultures and traditions, East and West, work with the notes: study them and play them. The core of the film consists of conversations of the director, an amateur gamba player himself, with master gambists about their personal exploration of the ancient works. How do they transform the notes into a personal, contemporary work of art? After the arousal about the rediscovery of the fantasia’s by the German gambist Thomas Fritzsch, it is exciting to find out how other masters on the instrument, from all over the world, approach the new old music – how will they make these silent notes sound?
teaser for 12 Fantasias