In this time – Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas

A performance by Tale Dolven and Alain Franco

17–20 September 2025

Black Box teater

150–250 kr

Showings and tickets

Wednesday, 17/09

18:00–19:30

Black Box teater

150–250 kr

Buy ticket

35 % off with ultiMATE

Thursday, 18/09

18:00–19:30

Black Box teater

150–250 kr

Buy ticket

35 % off with ultiMATE

Saturday, 20/09

18:00–19:30

Black Box teater

150–250 kr

Buy ticket

35 % off with ultiMATE

A dancer and a pianist meet Beethoven’s sonatas. Not with reverence, but with breath, body, and risk.

In In this time, dancer and choreographer Tale Dolven and pianist Alain Franco play, dance, and speak in a living dialogue with the past. Over three evenings at Black Box teater, they return to Beethoven’s 32 piano sonatas and navigate the cycle through three entry points:

What do these works tell us about form, content, and the future?

Day 1: Form
The evening begins with structure. The classical sonata form – opened and twisted. Beethoven’s own formal experiments. Movement follows, precise, yet pliable: between ballet, contemporary dance, and popular styles.

Day 2: Content

Now the sonatas speak. The Tempest, Les Adieux. Music filled with metaphor, memory and emotional undercurrents. The dance becomes more personal, the body more vulnerable. The music listens back.

Day 3: Future
What resonates after the final sonata? The Hammerklavier points toward Wagner, Feldman, Glass. Fragments, repetitions and long arcs. Time stretches. The stage becomes an outline of what is yet to come.

Dolven and Franco move seamlessly between dance, dialogue, and performance. Since these sonatas were never meant to be danced, Tale approaches them with freedom and physical curiosity. Alain refuses to treat them as museum artefacts. For him, they breathe: alive and unpredictable.

Together, they open a space for attentive presence. Music, movement, attention—everything unfolds in this time.

Facts

Beethoven’s piano sonatas, composed between 1795 and 1822, are often published in two heavy volumes – familiar fixtures in many homes, passed down through generations.
The title In this time suggests both time travel and an invitation to meet the past with a contemporary body and sensibility.
Tale Dolven has danced with Rosas and Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker and is now a house artist at RIMI/IMIR Scenekunst in Stavanger.
Alain Franco is a Brussels-based pianist who has worked with leading figures in music, dance and theatre, including Meg Stuart, Ictus and Romeo Castellucci.
Conversations are held in English.