Songcycle for a Sad Clown
Line up: An eerie cabaret by Sabine Pendry for clown, choir, clarinet, piano and percussion Composition, lyrics, concept, direction, performance: Sabine Pendry Arranging, co-composition: George Demetriou Clarinet, vocals: Hildur Elísa Jónsdóttir Piano, vocals: Nadia Bakhshi Percussion, vocals: Domen Cizej Dramaturgy: Ari Teperberg Clown costume: Raphael René Jacobs and Hildur Elísa Jónsdóttir Photography: Roman Ermolaev Host in Splendor: Claron McFadden

Claron McFadden presents:

Songcycle for a Sad Clown

An eerie cabaret by Sabine Pendry for clown, choir, clarinet, piano and percussion

In this concert, a strange creature invites you to make light of her troubles. She weeps in tune, craving laughter, applause, and most of all, pity. Her off-kilter ensemble echoes her lament…

Songcycle for a Sad Clown is an experimental music-theatre piece by singer/composer Sabine Pendry (premiering at O. Festival in 2027). This May 6th and 7th, she performs an alternative concert version of the staged piece in Splendor, diving into the sonic world of the clownesque together with musicians Hildur Elísa Jónsdóttir, Domen Cizej, Nadia Bakhshi, and George Demetriou.

Composition, lyrics, concept, direction, performance: Sabine Pendry
Arranging, co-composition: George Demetriou
Clarinet, vocals: Hildur Elísa Jónsdóttir
Piano, vocals: Nadia Bakhshi
Percussion, vocals: Domen Cizej
Dramaturgy: Ari Teperberg
Clown costume: Raphael René Jacobs and Hildur Elísa Jónsdóttir
Photography: Roman Ermolaev

Artist bio:
Sabine Pendry is an American-Dutch singer, performer, and music-theatremaker based in Amsterdam. Graduating from Sjaron Minailo’s Re:Master Opera program at the Sandberg Institute in 2024, she currently creates independent stage work and moves fluidly between composing, writing and direction.
Sabine’s pieces are sound-and-language driven, relying on the intimacy of the sung voice, heightened poetic texts and stark stage images to create peculiar and immersive worlds. She explores themes of grief, obsession, faith, death, and the absurd, and the ways these phenomena are mediated, performed and codified in contemporary culture. Musically she is inspired by folkloric melodies, opera, and extended vocal techniques.