CREDO is a large-scale, full-length multi-media project dealing with ethnic and religious conflicts. Different languages and disciplines supplement one another, resulting in a new form of communication. Music, video, interactivity and other new communication technologies are integral parts of the project, and assume a dramatic function within it. The piece is subdivided into a series of events / sequences. Its starting point is the idea that art – the performing arts as well as all communication technologies – have the right and duty to get involved, never losing sight of the fact that they must engage with the things that are fundamental to our society. Its theme is the necessity of coexistence between different cultures, and of having the capacity to grasp that the cultural difference of others is not a danger, but an opportunity.

The 'libretto' of CREDO – an anachronistic term in this context – was written by Achim Thorwald and the composer. It has likewise a strong multimedia character. Literary texts, especially Lessing's Nathan der Weise were associated to texts, photos and videos which approximately one hundred international correspondents had been gathering, for a year, as contributors to COLORS, a bilingual journal published regularly by Fabrica. The result is a multimedia mosaic.

For the world premiere, the internationally known vocalist David Moss had taken over a voluminous solo role. Singers Joy Frempong and Gunnlaug Thorvaldsdottir as well as Michael Rademacher (speaker, "Nathan") and a most convincing team of actors and instrumental soloists from all over the world made the evening a real event. The orchestra (Badische Staatskapelle), placed on the stage, was conducted by the composer. The production (stage director: Achim Thorwald) consequently used the theatre with all its possibilities. Gigantic projections introduced live events from other towns: Belfast, Istanbul, and Jerusalem. Stage, costumes, audio design, videos, interactive techniques involving the logo were designed for the production by various Fabrica departments.

The project was a coproduction between Fabrica (Benetton's Communication Research Centre) and the Badisches Staatstheater, Karlsruhe. The theatre's production team, led by Achim Thorwald – also responsible for the staging – has been an essential part of the project's development. The set was devised by Fabrica, and constructed in the workshops of the Karlsruhe Staatstheater. The live electronics were created by Fabrica, but the performance was in the hands of the theatre's sound-technicians.

Young vocalists and musicians, invited by Fabrica as scholarship holders to participate in this project were selected from many nations around the world, especially from those countries where the project's central theme, ethnic and religious conflict, is or was particularly significant. The aim of this dramaturgic-related (and not only dramaturgic) choice was not that of bringing together diverse musical cultures in a sort of trendy world-music group; rather, the object was to pinpoint and develop common elements – even personal elements, not just those tied to the culture of origin – of their musical language, seeking a really new, common emotional lexicon. The instrument that is able to represent such common elements in the simplest, most direct way is the human voice. So for Andrea Molino, it was logical to continue his collaboration with David Moss and his "Institute of Living Voice" (at the 'Transparent Theatre' in Antwerp).

The development and application of new communication technologies (live electronics and live video technology) was particularly important in CREDO: they enabled the development of unusual dramatic and musical concepts. So one of the ideas is that, during the performance in the city where the premiere of the project takes place, there are real-time audio and video links to other cities throughout the world, with the choice of cities being defined by their relevance to the theme of the project. With such live links, musicians can be directly switched into the performance from their own cities. For the premiere production, these cities were Jerusalem, Istanbul and Belfast. Video and multimedia material was created specially at Fabrica for this project. One of the technical attractions is the possibility of 'playing' videos musically ('sampling them', so to speak): the video sequences are projected live by the musicians, using Midi instruments, so as to create a very close, even rhythmic correspondence between video and music.

Yet however attractive the incorporation of these communication technologies may be, it should not, and must not, be an end in itself: it is there to assist the relevance of the result to the theme of CREDO; cities, musicians and technical strategies are all chosen in accord with this criterion.


CREDO has been supported by the European Community, as part of the Culture 2000 project.

CREDO has since been invited to open the Queensland Biennial Festival of Music 2005 in Brisbane/Australia, and was invited to Rome (Stazione Termini) on November 11, 2004 at the invitation of the Comune di Roma and the Gorbachev Foundation (on the occasion of the annual meeting of Nobel Peace Prize Winners). The production has been released on DVD.