Magic of the Otherworld

An interview with Christine Högl

Do you have a message you are trying to convey in the show?

There is an old Irish saying — "Take time for dreaming. It is the way to the stars." I would like to take the audience on a journey, discovering the magic of the 'Otherworld', a beautiful land beyond everyday life, where our dreams are at home. Nature is a wonderful place for dreaming. Since childhood, I have always spent time in nature talking to trees, birds, flowers, the wind and the light, the mountains and rivers, the ocean, the stars and the moon. They speak to us in a fine language. We only need to be quiet and listen. Nature's music is the most beautiful music, singing and whispering sounds of beauty into our hearts. It has been my inspiration for the music in Magic of the Otherworld.

The Otherworld itself is a never-ending adventure where we can experience the secrets of life. It means I have to be open for the true beauty within all things, and find ways to express it through my art. It means I also have to open myself to wisdom beyond my intellect, bringing mine together with the spirits of the Otherworld. I use the Celtic harp as a 'voice' to communicate it. I am no angel, no fairy, but simply a harpist sharing my love, joy and vision of life through my music. I feel myself as a 'bridge', reminding people to enjoy the paradise we have on Earth and feeling our true nature as human beings. I wish that all the music and visions we did in the show may serve as a 'shuttle' to enter this Otherworld — the home of our dreams, visions and imagination. So 'take time for dreaming' and enjoy the show!

How did the idea for this show come to be?

Through my 20-year friendship with Eduard Thomas (Director of Mediendom Kiel) and his wife Berit, we found that we enjoy the same things — the stars and beauty of the universe, a passion for flowers, nature and philosophy. Many letters, emails and phone calls with our thoughts, poems and lyrics of great writers are often going back and forth between us. During visits, we would imagine how wonderful it would be to visualize our ideas of the Otherworld as a fulldome show.

At the end of 2010, Eduard called me. To my surprise, he said: "I have found sponsors, and with a small budget, we can at least start the production; the rest we will see about later. Are you ready to begin?" I was thrilled!

Working together with Eduard Thomas was a great pleasure. For 20 years, his staff has provided the visual projections for my live concerts in planetariums. Eduard is the perfect manager, making impossible things happen. Above all, he has a fine sense in directing shows and bringing together soul of science, the arts... and often many things more.

It was great to work with Joachim Perschbacher from Northdocks Company, who did all the 3D animation. He also has a fine sense and feeling for my music, so he could find just the right images to go with my ideas. Bernhard Schmidt agreed to take care of all sound design and audio work, which was great. So this was a perfect cooperation to create magical moments. Of course, there were many others who helped and worked with us. My heartfelt thanks to all of them!

We had a vision to create a show of beauty and magical moments for the modern planetarium theater. We had a very small budget and the challenge was to make the impossible happen. The whole team has unconditionally given its best to realize the project. We proved that it is not all about money. It was an experience of working together in the spirit of 'another world' — with much creativity and joyful teamwork. I am so happy that a dream came true we can share now with the world. It is not just a 'show', but expression of our spirits and our lives as artists and human beings. I wish that many people enjoy the show.

What is your experience in planetarium theaters?

As of 2013, I am celebrating 20 years of 'HARP MUSIC UNDER THE STARRY SKY' (Read more in "A Ticket To Heaven" (PDF), an article that appeared in the IPS Journal Planetarian in 2004.)

Since I started my live performances, it has been a journey full of adventures and great moments. I wish to build a ladder to the stars where the audience can enjoy delving into another dimension. The ambience of planetarium theaters is a perfect setting for my music and audiences just love it.

Even after so many years of playing harp in planetariums, I still feel the magic of the starry sky. And the journey continues! I am looking forward to performing in international planetariums for years to come.

What are your thoughts about your chosen instrument, the Celtic harp?

For Magic of the Otherworld the Celtic harp is perfect! It is my style anyway. In the fulldome show I want the audience to listen to my music in its natural form, as if I were playing it live. So I did music with no filled-up arrangements or glossy packaging; it is just me and the solo harp. We lightly added only some sounds of nature to go with music and images. In the snowy mountain scene, I was happy to invite my friends of Trio Mystique that I play with.

I think the music of Magic of the Otherworld does not overload and 'fill up' the listener, but gives space to enjoy the moments — which is also a secret of the Otherworld.

How did you and Joachim approach the mixing of music and visuals for each scene?

In the beginning, I provided the basic ideas for the nature scenes and all music, and suggested typical Otherworld scenes. I also had to make sure the show production kept close to the spirit of the Otherworld. I wrote the text (for the opening of the show, the press releases, etc.). This gave direction and inspiration for the visuals as well.

Then, Joachim had free rein to fill the storyboard with colorful images and creative details. Eduard and Berit's fine sense and know-how for both fulldome visuals and music always gave the right direction. The visual appearance of the starry sky and the universe was up to Joachim and Eduard. As planetarium guys, that is their playground. I followed with the music, and was free to bring in my new songs.

Finally, when new fulldome scenes were ready, we met at Mediendom Kiel, because it is only in a dome that you can get the real 3D fulldome impression. A normal computer screen cannot show it. Those moments were always most exciting and brought up many vivid emotions.

When you did the green-screen scenes of you playing, did you already know what the CGI would look like? Did you know you were going to be on a lily pad, or in a tree, at the seashore, on a glacier, or in a cavern, lit by a shaft of sunlight?

The production was sparked by our enthusiasm and new ideas came from much playfulness. In the beginning we had a lot of funny ideas and imagined the wildest things, such as where to place me in the scenes. The 'low-budget-reality' blew away some of our fantasies, but others we were able to realize.

I knew about the stalactite cave, but I had no idea what it would eventually look like; same with the lily pad, the tree, seashore and glacier. In the end, they were always a big surprise for me, but always delightful.

Preparing the different sets for filming on the green screen is worth a whole movie just for fun. Our 'green-screen stories' will keep us laughing for a long time. Here is one of the best: for filming the lily pad scene, I brought my best rainbow-colored summer dress. I thought it will be lovely, like a butterfly. Well... when I came in with my dress on, the whole staff was shocked, and said "This is impossible!" I was irritated, because I was thinking of myself as the most beautiful 'butterfly' in this outfit. But then they explained that my dress unfortunately had just about ALL colors imaginable. So whatever 'green (or black or blue or yellow etc.) -screen' they chose, it would always cut off pieces of me when compositing for the final film. After lots of jokes about my 'well-chosen dress' (and I had no alternative clothes with me) and after many long hours, they found a trick to make the scene work. I was happy!

What is your favorite scene in the show?

My favorite is The Sailing Ship. I love it! Visual and music are gorgeous together, as they are sailing away into the universe. This scene 'happened' in the flow of creating, and turned out to have such beauty and magic!

It always moves me deeply when I watch the scene. To me it is the moment where the journey is fulfilled. The moon is a symbol for feelings and intuition, and as human beings we hopefully reconnect to the world within. It is all about 'coming home' to our soul and true self.

In the old Celtic tradition, it is the ship that brings our soul to the Otherworld (mostly a mystical island) when we pass away. Joachim had chosen this image intuitively, without knowing about this background. My music to the scene is a free improvisation, in the same spirit.

Has any of the music been previously released on your albums, or was it recorded all-new just for Magic of the Otherworld?

There are some of my previous compositions whose music was perfect. But I chose only two existing tracks from my recorded albums: Mountain music (with Trio Mystique), and Sunset music. All the other music in Magic of the Otherworld was recorded just for the show.

How, when and where did you first see the snowy mountain scenes?

I think it was last winter when I saw first time the snowy mountain scene at Mediendom Kiel. I was thrilled, because it looked so real. The 'dance of the snowflakes' is beautifully done and goes so well with the soundtrack of harp, saxophone and percussion. The whole scene gives an impression of the silent vastness of the mountains — certainly a place of the Otherworld.

Of course, it was a fanciful idea to place me on top of the mountains while playing harp. I grew up in the Alps of Upper Bavaria with a lot of snow and skiing, so I felt quite natural in these surroundings.

The forest looks very real. Was it your idea to place yourself inside the knot-hole of one tree?

The forest in the show is beautiful and I love it. It was Joachim's playful idea to place me inside a knot-hole of a linden tree. It is an unexpected nice surprise, and I hope the audience smiles while watching the scene.

While standing on a lily pad in a pond, your playing entices a nearby flower to open up and spray a burst of pollen in the air. You're good! But we had to worry about how you'd clean the pollen off your harp — or whether you might have allergies!

I smiled when I saw the scene on the lily pad with the burst of pollen in the air, and I thought, "oh, this is too much Hollywood!" Well, at least it can give something for the audience to smile about too.

During the abstract scene with the cascading patterns of bubbles, your music becomes decidedly non-Celtic; it's almost blues-y and jazzy, somber and moody.

I like adventure, stepping into the 'unknown' and trying out new sounds. This particular scene was the moment for it! I improvised with an Asian-sounding scale to express a joyful, fancy and light feeling, with a calm and moody part in between.

I played an electric MIDI harp here, which has a brilliant clear sound and nice warm bass. It came from Bernhard Schmidt, a professional harp maker. He did all the sound design for Magic of the Otherworld.

The ghostly galloping horse is one of our favorite scenes. Was this one of your suggestions?

The horse was Joachim's idea, and it is a final highlight. I enjoyed combining it with the rhythm of my 'tango' song. A nice 'firework' to celebrate the end of the show!

Any final comments?

I think the personally-directed company of Mark and Carolyn Petersen is a perfect distribution partner for our show. Both Mark and Carolyn are "old fellows" in the planetarium scene. Loch Ness Productions is internationally well-known, and for decades they have done many good things for the planetarium community. They enjoyed my very first fulldome show performance, during the 2004 IPS Conference Valencia, Spain. For us, it is important working with a distributor who has both a love of the stars, and a high level of expertise as well. Besides, Mark makes music for planetariums himself; he is well-known as GEODESIUM. So I think we are in good hands.

Thank you, Christine.