A girl without shoes tries to sell sulphur matches on a cold wintry day. Hans Christian Andersen's well-known fairy tale tells a story of poverty, love, despair and light. In his 2008 Pulitzer Prize-winning composition »the little match girl passion«, David Lang interweaves the fairy tale with texts from the »St. Matthew Passion«. Together with Joseph Haydn's »Missa in angustiis«, the mass for troubled times – better known as the »Nelson Mass« – the story of an abandoned and unnoticed girl becomes the inspiration and basis for ballet director and chief choreographer Mario Schröder. The first premiere of the season addresses sthe ocio-political issues of our time: dwindling solidarity, loneliness, environmental catastrophes, wars. The interplay between the abstraction of the fairy tale and the varying ensembles of the compositions by David Lang and Joseph Haydn, Mario Schröder has created a strong plea for empathy and community, hope and humanism as a warming vision for an uncertain time.

For children and teenagers aged 14 and older