Parade (AL)

The ten musicians of neo-fanfare 9×13 lead a parade ahead of a performance by the local music association—during the Oranjewoud Festival, this is the Heerenveen brass band Pro Rege. It appears familiar, almost nostalgic—but is that image really accurate? Isn’t 9×13 precisely the collective that has been questioning, stretching, and reinventing that very fanfare tradition for years? Is this a Trojan horse being wheeled in?

With Parade, 9×13 presents a heartfelt tribute to art, music, and imagination, as well as to the rich Dutch tradition of community music associations—where people come together to create something beautiful, where making music is not about perfection, but about joy and the human act of playing.

Parade is thematically and visually inspired by the iconic Parade from 1917, in which composer Erik Satie, artist Pablo Picasso, writer Jean Cocteau, and choreographer Léonide Massine collaborated. Like that revolutionary work, 9×13 plays with the boundary between backstage and frontstage, between preparation and performance, between expectation and reality.

Parade is a theatrical fanfare that moves and surprises. It is a performance that does not break with tradition, but opens it up—tilting the familiar, inviting the audience to look again, and above all, to join in.