“Eerily beautiful baroque arias and dramatic opera scenes with chorus draw in an audience that wouldn’t normally cross the threshold of established opera houses. It’s an approach that works perfectly here. Around eight hundred young people gather together to watch, and by the end are completely captivated.”
Rowan was founder and producer of KIEZ OPER — a label based in Berlin, which brought opera to uninitiated audiences in unusual settings.
Kiez Oper projects included Dido and Aeneas in techno club Salon zur wilden Renate in 2012 — a production that later transferred to Wilderness Festival, and new narrative work Insanity in the basin of dry-swimming pool-techno club STATTBAD — both directed by Andrew Staples. Multidisciplinary performance Mauerklänge combined projections from Tresor club Art Director Tofa with ballet, lieder and chamber music in St. Elisabeth Kirche as part of the Berlin Festival of Lights, Acis and Galatea was performed outdoors at disused factory-techno club Griessmühle, with a revival at open-air club ELSE on the banks of the Spree, and Il trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno in 2018 utilised multiple spaces in mint-turned contemporary art space and club Alte Münze, in a production with promenade prelude by Julia Burbach.