Julian Barnes’ novel “The Noise of Time” portrays the Soviet composer Dmitri Shostakovich during the years of Stalinist terror. With his reading, actor Ulrich Noethen offers the audience an impression of an artist’s life caught between conformity and resistance, fear and creativity. And where words fall silent, the music takes over: carefully selected excerpts, closely aligned with the text, bring the composer’s emotional world to life.
"The Noise of Time”
Programme
Reading from Julian Barnes’ novel “The Noise of Time” alongside music by Dmitri Shostakovich:
Elegy. Adagio from Two Pieces for String Quartet
Allegro non troppo from Symphony No. 5 in D minor, Op. 47 (arranged for piano four hands; original for orchestra, arrangement by Levon Atovmyan)
Allegretto from Piano Trio No. 2 in E minor, Op. 67
Allegretto from Symphony No. 7 in C major “Leningrad”, Op. 60 (arranged for piano four hands; original for orchestra, arrangement by Levon Atovmyan)
Allegretto from String Quartet No. 8 in C minor, Op. 110
Allegretto from Symphony No. 10 in E minor, Op. 93 (arranged for piano four hands; original for orchestra)
Cast
Armida Quartet
Martin Funda, violin
Johanna Staemmler, violin
Teresa Schwamm-Biskamp, viola
Peter-Philipp Staemmler, violoncello
GrauSchumacher Piano Duo
Not to be missed. The GrauSchumacher Piano Duo have perfected the art of piano playing for four hands. […] The decisive factor is the freedom they achieve in concert at the moment of making music. (Süddeutsche Zeitung)
Ulrich Noethen
Ulrich Noethen, born Ulrich Schmid, is a German stage and film actor. He grew up in a pastor’s family in Neu-Ulm on the Danube and later in Augsburg, where he completed his secondary education. He initially studied law before transferring to the Stuttgart University of Music and Performing Arts, where he completed his acting training. He adopted his mother’s maiden name, Noethen, as his stage name.
Ulrich Noethen began his acting career between 1985 and 1987 at the municipal theatres in Freiburg. This was followed by further theatre engagements with the Zelt-Ensemble Birach (1988), a two-year period at Schauspiel Köln, and later at the State Theatre stages in Berlin. When these were closed, he moved into film.
Since 1994, Ulrich Noethen has worked successfully in film and television. Since 2014, he has played a leading role as psychiatrist Dr Johannes Jessen in the television series Neben der Spur. In the 2015 film adaptation The Diary of Anne Frank, he portrayed Anne’s father, Otto Heinrich Frank. In the second season of Charité, he played the physician and prominent 20th-century surgeon Ferdinand Sauerbruch.
Ulrich Noethen was married to actress Friederike Wagner until 2009; they have one daughter together. He lives with the Russian-German writer Alina Bronsky and her three children from a previous marriage; the couple also have a daughter together. They live in Berlin-Charlottenburg.
Dorothee Kalbhenn
Dorothee Kalbhenn has made a name for herself as a specialist in holistic concert concepts. An interdisciplinary thinker with a strong creative drive, she understands the classical concert as a space for community and naturally incorporates socially relevant topics—without losing focus on the music itself.
The cultural manager served for five years as Program Director at the Konzerthaus Berlin, where she was responsible for around 150 concerts annually and established numerous new concert formats and festivals. In 2024, her project “Die Orchestergesellschaft” received the prestigious OPUS Klassik award in the category “Innovative Concert of the Year.” Prior to this, from 2011 to 2021, she was part of the team at the Elbphilharmonie and Laeiszhalle Hamburg, which opened the Elbphilharmonie in 2017, and she developed the sponsorship structure for the new venue. At the same time, she managed the chamber orchestra ensemble reflektor, with which she received the Max Brauer Prize of the Toepfer Foundation and the Ensemble Prize of the Nordmetall Foundation in 2019, and which founded the ultraBACH festival in Lüneburg.
She studied cultural studies and music at Leuphana University Lüneburg—where she continues to teach as a lecturer—and at Eastern Illinois University (USA). Her research work “Konzertprogramme” (2011) was published by Peter Lang, and her study on transculturality in the concert world (2018) by transcript Verlag.
Today, Dorothee Kalbhenn works as an artistic advisor for numerous renowned festivals, concert halls, and orchestras, including Heidelberger Frühling, Philharmonie Essen, Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Sommerliche Musiktage, Musikwoche Hitzacker, and the Budapest Festival Orchestra. As a systemic organizational consultant (trained at Simon Weber Friends), she supports companies in developing effective future strategies. She also regularly moderates artist talks, special concerts, and events at various festivals, concert venues, and industry conferences.