Kaperlak hovers between mediums, categorising itself as a music theatre piece – it is at once theatre, a soundscape, and performance art. Some of the most effective performances happen on the boundaries between disciplines, and there is the sense here that Jane Deasy has taken elements from different disciplines to create something that attempts to transcend them all in its execution. A graduate of Music and Drama at Trinity, Deasy has a residency at the Pearse Centre, where Kaperlak was performed as part of the Tiger Dublin Fringe Theatre Festival.
The initial tableau is immediately arresting. A prone form lies inscribed in a circle of sand beside an old radio and half-buried piece of bone, with back to audience, silent and still for the entire prologue. Filtered blue and green lighting cues lend an alien air to this strange space. The environment is establishing itself as the audience enter. The musicians negotiate their small environment via sound, exploring the various effects that can be achieved without instruments by tapping, scraping and drawing their hands and nails across various implements, eliciting noises that usher the audience into a richly textured sonic environment that is at once post-apocalyptic and unsettlingly familiar.
Kaperlak is resolutely abstract, and its elusive form borrows from the postmodern and postdramatic without committing to either, which is greatly to its advantage. Deasy approaches her work conceptually and the effect here is unsettling, with clips from nature documentaries and weather reports punctuating the dense soundscape, in lieu of any sort of narrative that could have a grounding effect. The familiar voice of David Attenborough does not reassure the audience in this piece, but rather echoes from the past, serving as a reminder of what has been lost in this post-apocalyptic environment.
The music itself is beautifully euphonic despite its dissonance, intensely contemporary and irresistibly fascinating. Unconventional techniques such as scratch tones and throat singing are used, which give the piece an immense power – it is sometimes surprising to remember that it is being performed live, and the sounds heard are being created by human hands and voices and not some ghostly figures from after the world has ended.
Kaperlak has the feel of Beckett’s later abstract pieces, with the unmoving form inscribed in a circle for the prologue, then waking and delivering a monologue during the act. The monologue alternates between painful vulnerability and disdainful aloofness – sharp sentences delivered with a simmering anger. The soundscape continues unrelenting, affected by the extended techniques of playing so that a dense field of sound holds the audience captive in its environment. Kaperlak is best described as an experience rather than merely a play or piece of music – aligning the end of the world with the feeling of personal apocalypse when suffering acute mental trauma. Its soundworld is lush and wholly distinctive, and its performers are seamless in their execution of this challenging and rewarding piece that holds its own on the frontier of music theatre.
