Baar Amsterdam – 30.12

A performance with music by Jacques Brel

There are few places that remain on the world’s map. Places that endure, where people meet, meet again and find themselves anew. It is better when wine flows in these places, music flows, and tender words flow—words that move the soul to its core.

“Baar Amsterdam” is a place and a moment where Jacques Brel’s bright-sounding world meets the question of everything one must live through and pass through for the beauty we embrace to come into being. A circle of light. A microphone. A grim-faced master. “Ne me quitte pas” he sings, with his soul laid bare and his face drenched in the sweat of exertion.

Jacques Brel’s aim and focus was to tell stories whose essence was always built on emotion. Brel made himself the direct messenger of his work, reaching people through words and song. He let his soul resonate with everything he knew and had felt. This performance has the same aim: to take the audience on a journey to the farthest reaches of the human soul, touching the corners from which we are stitched together. But it also asks: would this stitching exist at all without an artist—without a person—opening up and burning outwardly and inwardly?

The performance moves from the light, sublime and moving into the depths, even the unsettling, and does not shy away from uncomfortable questions: which dark side is inevitable, and which justification is unjustifiable?

The performance takes place in a salon-like meeting space. Brel’s songs are theatrical in form. Above all, may wine flow in “Baar Amsterdam.”

On stage: Jarmo Reha, Jaak Lutsoja (accordion) and Aili Nael

Writer and director: Jarmo Reha
Artists: Ulvi Tiit and Allan Appelberg
Dramaturgical assistance: Laur Kaunissaare
Song lyrics translator: Indrek Koff
Sound designer: Lauri Kaldoja
Lighting designer: Sasha Mirson

Premiere: 13 December 2025 at Ekspeditsiooni stuudio Krulli majas