
The Unfinished Concert
Dortmund Concert Hall
Issue 24 | September 2012
Agency
Jung von Matt Hamburg
Creative Team
Agency Manager: Jens Pfau, Peter Stroeh, Tobias Grimm Creative Director: Jens Pfau Film Producer: Jannik Endemann Project Manager: Annette Krebs Concept: Steffen Koenig, Till Felber, Julia Radlwimmer, Katrin Stanek
Production Team
Production Company: Markenfilm Hamburg
Date
May 2012
Background
Dortmund Concert Hall celebrated its tenth anniversary in May 2012 at the same time of another anniversary. It was exactly 100 years ago that the Titanic went down.
To mark the two occasions and to demonstrate their passion for music, the orchestra went on its first musical expedition.
Idea
When the Titanic sank, the orchestra of eight musicians played to the very last. According to witnesses, the last song they played was ‘Nearer My God To Thee’. Tragically, their concert was never finished.
Dortmund Concert Hall decided that they would mark the centenary by finishing the concert at the exact location (41° 44’ N, 49° 57’ W) and at the exact time (2.20am) that the liner went down.
Eight musicians set sail for the North Atlantic and duly performed, this time getting to the very end of the hymn, ‘Nearer My God To Thee’.
The very last note of the piece was left as a buoy in the North Atlantic.
A mailing was sent to 300 of the world’s top soloists to tell them about this passion for music. The pack/mailing was a waterproof expedition bag with the Unfinished label on it. It contained a book with a cover letter, a travel card, a diary of the trip and pictures accompanying it. In addition to that there was a CD containing all the information including videos.
There was almost a 100% response. If the event and the mailshot can persuade one international star to perform at the Dortmund Concert Hall, that will be the cherry on the cake.
Results
The expedition was followed by thousands in real time at www.the-unfinished.de and more thousands have visited the site since the musicians’ return.
They had become a key visual for the Titanic Memorial, which reached over 25 million people within three days and around 50 million to date.
1,500 emails with interview requests and responses to the performance have been received.
Our Thoughts
I have made the comment elsewhere that the nature of advertising work is changing from creating selling messages to creating telling moments, events and actions that don’t just reflect popular culture but which actually give it shape and meaning. This is one such instance. The merging of advertising, publishing, movie-making and story-telling in all forms is all happening under the guise of ‘branded content’. Whether branded content does lead to additional sales (or, in this case, additional bums on seats) is still uncertain. But as I have also noted, that too is heartening because despite all the attention to data these days, advertising is still an art, not a science.