Status: 08/30/2023 3:40 p.m
The two sisters Danae and Kiveli Dörken not only have family ties, they also make music together, founded a festival on the island of Lesbos and even live in the same house. Yet they are different.
You come from a German-Greek family, grew up in Düsseldorf and learned to play the piano at an early age. The sisters Danae and Kiveli Dörken studied with the legendary Karl-Heinz Kämmerling at the Hanover University of Music. After Kämmerling’s death, Kiveli, who was four years her junior, switched to Lars Vogt’s class. Eight years ago they founded the Molyvos International Music Festival on the island of Lesvos. It takes place every summer and is entirely dedicated to chamber music. Just in time for the release of their debut album as a piano duo, Danae and Kiveli present parts of their program “Apollo & Dionysus” on NDR Kultur EXTRA. She got to know both gods in her childhood through the stories of her Greek grandmother when she visited her on Lesvos in the summer.
We want to talk about your preoccupation with Apollon und Dionysos, that’s also the name of your new album. On the one hand it is about form and order and on the other hand it is about intoxication, which has played a very decisive role in art aesthetics. Who is which of you? Who is more Apollonian and who more Dionysian?
Kiveli Dörken: I think we fall pretty heavily into the archetypal older-and-younger-sister system. I would say that maybe I, the younger sister, would be naturally more attracted to the Dionysian energy, Danae more to the Apollonian energy. When we are together, we complement each other all the better. When we are together we have the balance of these two energies. That makes our cooperation much, much nicer.
Your grandmother on the island of Lesvos inspired you to learn more about Greek mythology and get into it. What did she tell you?
Kiveli Dörken: Although we are half German, half Greek, we grew up very Greek. The bedtime stories that are read to Greek toddlers are always stories from mythology: the heroic sagas from Greek mythology, the Genesis story from mythology and the various Olympian gods are presented. We had a couple of big books, one book was the “Twelve Gods of Olympus”, one book was the “Odyssey”, one was chosen myths from Greek mythology. We always had them read to us and these stories are simply part of growing up and have certainly accompanied us from a young age.
Some of these are horrific stories for children.
Danae Dörken: Clear. There are brutal and tragic elements, of course, but as a kid you kind of accept it. The interesting thing is that these are very archetypal stories. I often catch myself thinking back to some of these stories from mythology and can certainly derive things for life. These are things that you can identify with very early on. I think that’s why they have a value in our culture today. In other cultures, this Greek mythology is a foundation that remains. We are therefore very grateful that we were able to get to know them as children.
AUDIO: Piano music for four hands with the Dörken sisters (55 min)
Are the roles clearly assigned to you? Who plays the keyboard above and who below? Danae, you’re playing upstairs today.
Danae Dörken: Musically, the roles are distributed quite clearly. I mostly play upstairs and Kiveli mostly downstairs. There are also musical reasons for this, because these are very different things that you have to pay attention to. For example, the one playing downstairs always does the pedal and is responsible for the warmth of the sound. The one playing above often has these cantilenas in the treble. In our life, the roles are not clearly divided, there is a give and take between us. It’s not the case that one takes one position and the other takes the other.
You live in the same house.
Danae Dörken: Exactly. We are also very close in life. And we really have a very close relationship. Of course, this also helps with gaming. But of course it’s just wonderful for us too, that you have a sister with whom you can share everything, because we do the same thing in life, we’re both pianists. This is of course a great gift.
Apollo and Dionysus, these two antipodes, don’t get along with each other either. You yourself once visited the oracle of Delphi and took a special piece of wisdom with you.
Kiveli Dörken: During a tour of the Delphic Oracle, we were first introduced to the idea that the Delphic Oracle has two gods guarding it. One is Apollo, the more famous of the two, he was in charge of the oracle at Delphi. But Dionysus was also a god who repeatedly traveled to the oracle of Delphi to give his advice. What is very clearly anchored in this Greek philosophy and which can be found again and again is this idea that there are both energies. Most people may have one of these energies naturally more prominent. But growing up, making decisions and integrating is always about carrying both energies within you, finding yourself and being able to draw advice from both. This is something that of course applies to both of us as a piano duo, which takes place relatively effortlessly. But it also applies to us as individuals, to everyone as an individual. You have to cultivate both sides in yourself in order to be able to make really wise decisions.
Danae Dörken: And it’s important to be open to the other side that you’re not naturally attracted to.
The conversation was led by Philipp Cavert.
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NDR Culture | NDR Culture EXTRA | 08/30/2023 | 13:00 ‘O clock
Keywords for this article
Classic
2023-08-30 20:13:53
#Piano #music #hands #Dörken #sisters
