The Ives Concert Series Presents a Night of Music and Silent Film
Peter Krasinski is performing at The United Church of Christ at Dartmouth College on Monday, October 12th.
6:30pm Family friendly Pre-Show
7:30pm VAMPYR 1932)
Learn more about Peter and his work at krasinski.org. This is a free event thanks to a generous gift of the Ives family.
The evening begins at 6:30 PM with the Family Friendly Pre-Show for Children of all ages!
Organist Peter Krasinski will give an introduction to the pipe organ on the big screen that will fascinate the curious in all of us: why are there so many keys? Do you really play music with your feet? What makes those sounds? What does it mean to “pull out all the stops?” Included in this sonic adventure will the the Buster Keaton short film THE ELECTRIC HOUSE, the always exciting Toccata and Fugue in d minor by J. S. Bach, and a special appearance of a very famous conductor from the past! Don’t miss it!
The evening continues with the main feature presented for mature audiences, the incredibly creepy unsettling VAMPYR directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer (famous for his film JOAN OF ARC)
Wanting to create a story based on the supernatural, Dreyer read over thirty mystery stories. He found a number of re-occurring elements, such as doors opening mysteriously and door handles moving with no one knowing why, which helped him feel that, “We can jolly well make this stuff too”. The success of the stage version of Dracula in London and New York in 1927 contributed to Dreyer’s assessment that vampires were “fashionable things at the time”.
It was written by Dreyer and Christen Jul based on elements from Sheridan Le Fanu’s 1872 collection of supernatural stories In a Glass Darkly. The film was funded by, Baron Nicolas de Gunzburg, who (credited as Julian West) also played the starring role of Allan Gray, a student of the occult who wanders into the French village of Courtrmpierre which is under the curse of a vampire. Most of the other members of the cast were also non-professional actors.
The film presented a number of technical challenges for Dreyer, as it was his first sound film and was recorded in three languages. To simplify matters, he decided to use very little dialogue in the film, and much of the story is told with title cards like a silent film. The sound was added in Berlin post-production. This performance will feature only the sound of the pipe organ. The film was shot entirely on location, and to enhance the atmospheric content the soft focus technique was applied.
All of the accompaniment for this event (except for the Bach) will the improvised on the spot by our artist, Peter Krasinski