One of Poland’s best known innovative theatres, Teatr Pieśń Kozła, (Song of the Goat Theatre) opens today a series of performances in London’s Barbican Centre. 

The company is presenting  Shakespeare’s Macbeth in a production that explores the musicality and muscularity of the Bard’s poetry and the colours and sounds of his extraordinary language.

In an interview for The Daily Telegraph, producer Grzegorz Bral said: “If people come and see our Shakespeare, it will have nothing to do with the kind of Shakespeare they are used to. We don’t destroy the text. On the contrary we are trying to find aspects of it that are normally not used - we’re finding the musicality of it.”

The Song of the Goat Theatre was founded in 1996. One of its earlier productions - Chronicles – a lamentation -  won the Scotsman Fringe First and Herald Angel awards at the Edinburgh Fringe 2004 and in the same year  was invited to LaMaMa in New York. In 2008 the company sang for the Dalai Lama during his visit to Wroclaw and in 2009 was nominated for the prestigious European Prize / New Theatrical Realities.

Macbeth will be shown at the Barbican till 20 November. It then moves to Brighton for three performances (25-27 November).  Last month the company performed in Eastleigh, Birmingham, Cambridge and Manchester. (mk)