Kooky trio Tiger Lillies back in town
The Tiger Lillies are back in town, bringing the air of a Brechtian Berlin cabaret to the capital’s Badminton Theater in the military park in Goudi in a run of shows until June 10. The cult British trio, who have played to packed houses in Greece in the past, have drawn their inspiration from Hans Christian Andersen’s «Little Match Girl» and the much-lauded sea. Martyn Jacques (vocals, accordion), Adrian Huge (drums, percussion, toys) and Adrian Stout (contrabass, musical saw, vocals) gave a press conference prior to their opening performance on Wednesday. «’The Little Match Girl’ began two years ago, when the Hans Christian Andersen Center asked us to create a show based on this story for the 200-year anniversary since Andersen’s birth,» said Jacques. «I decided to do it first of all because it was the shortest, and also because I remembered it very clearly from my childhood. What was interesting and unusual was that, because the story is so short, I basically had to write a song of every paragraph.» For Adrian Stout, «it is one of Hans Christian Andersen’s saddest stories because it is not just a tragic tale, but also carries a social message about a situation that persists even to this day… Often, when we performed it in Paris, people would come out of the theater teary-eyed because it is so emotional. Another reason that makes this production special is that while our songs are usually extremely provocative – we have even been called Satanists – this particular tale, and because Andersen was a very religious man, talks about a little girl going to heaven.» In the second part of the performance, Jacques explains, the trio has used songs taken mostly from their album «The Sea» and included the participation of Greek actor Yiannis Voglis reading extracts from Homer’s «Odyssey,» as well as poems by Nikos Kavvadias and Samuel T. Coleridge. They will also be joined by acclaimed pianist and composer Hans-Joern Brandenburg and Vanessa Adam on the harp. «The performance will also include songs from other albums, some of which we performed in The Tiger Lillies Circus in Greece at the Big Top theater and the Gyalino Dinner Theater. Basically, these are all songs about the sea, a subject that is loved by many. I have certain favorite themes that inspire me. One is the circus and another is the world of the sea, the world of ports, of sailors, of the brothels at ports; this world that is constantly on the move, people who spend their lives on a ship, with no real home, no real base. It is a world that I find charming, colorful, all different tastes and colors, and also very hard.» Tickets are available at Virgin Megastores. For credit card reservations tel 210.884.0600 or log on to www.ticketnet.gr. Performances begin at 9.30 p.m.
