The idea behind the chorical dinner show "The Flying Cow"
After the strategic decision to pursue the vision of an "affective hospitality" and to implement it in the curriculum, SSTH Hotelfachschule Passugg was faced with the challenge of making this abstract idea quickly tangible. The "Affective Hospitality" approach is primarily about the art of creating an emotional experience for the guest.
In order to introduce both students and the general public to the topic of an affective education, an unprecedented event was created in the following.
Michael Hartmann, Managing Director and CEO of the SSTH:
"This innovative approach corresponds to the "Affective Hospitality" vision of our hotel management school, because experience is the best way to learn. “Affective Hospitality" focuses on the individual emotions - and how could these be better presented than on a unique experience evening?”
Following this vision, Michael Hartmann, together with star director Felix Benesch, musical director Christian Klucker and Gion Martin Fetz, Executive Chef of the SSTH, created the first and only chorical dinner show. Culture and culinary delights combine at the SSTH to create a unique evening.
Choir singing, storytelling, show and theatre combine with selected delicacies to create an experience that appeals to all the senses. Because such multisensual experiences and the emotions associated with them determine the expectations and experiences of the guests. In this holistic production, everyone - from the organizer, student and choir member to the guest - is part of the experience. For future employees in the hotel and catering industry, this means that they must develop emotional skills in addition to traditional service skills.
"Affective Hospitality," explained in a play written especially for the occasion
The starting point of theatre story is a very special task that Felix Benesch entrusted to the SSTH Hotel Management School Passugg: An anonymous investor would like to invest a three-digit million sum in a forward-looking hotel business in Graubünden. He attaches a condition to this investment: He would like to have a special experience as a guest on an evening to be determined. One that really touches him, surprises him and convinces him. Because he has already seen everything from "Eleven Madison Park" in NYC to "Above Eleven" in Bangkok and "Sublimotion" in Ibiza to Caminada's "Schauenstein", he turns to the next generation of hoteliers and restaurateurs. The young hotel management students should show what they burn for and what they can do.
The SSTH Hotel Management School Passugg is organising a project competition. In working groups the students develop different concepts for a unique theater evening, which is to provide the guests this special experience. On the one hand, the students draw on the full potential of their education, on the other hand they are also called upon to think further, reinterpret and creatively expand what they have learnt as well as the latest trends. The guests are thus immersed in the daily routine of studying at a hotel management school.
Michael Hartmann, Managing Director and CEO of SSTH:
"We see the SSTH as a training center and laboratory where students can learn about new trends and gain their own expertice with emotionally charged experiences. In the project, students have the opportunity not only to experience future-oriented events, but also to help shape them. »
The Dinner Show as a guest experience
On the show evening itself, the students, played by the members of the incantanti choir, present the "perfect experiences" they have created in working groups. The culinary crew of the SSTH under the direction of Gion Martin Fetz will offer a unique, sensual gourmet experience.
The dinner show will be accompanied by the vocal ensemble incantanti under the musical direction of Christian Klucker. Choir singing, theatre, history, atmosphere, enjoyment and much more round off the evening to an unprecedented adventure.
The guests of the SSTH experience evening are part of the production, they are welcomed as a selected, invited test audience, who will secretly choose which of the presented projects will be implemented. This winning project will then be presented to the anonymous investor at an upcoming event in the Restaurant VaBene in Chur.
What are the learning goals of the students?
At the Chorical Dinner Show the students of the SSTH experience within "the flying cow" not only what "Affective Hospitality" means. They themselve will be part of the production and involved in various areas of responsibility. Edutainment at its best! The storyline is not only developed, but also implemented in interdisciplinary teams between direction, choir, culinary arts and teaching.
- Creative implementation of the storyline
- Collaboration in the coordination of the menu sequence and culinary implementation of the history and effects of the Chorical Dinner Show
- Own design of the service and the guest care analogous to the storyline to create a harmonious guest experience
- Appearance via sales pitch and cooperation in the search for sponsors for further affective projects
Storytelling, personal reference, atmosphere, choral singing, timing, memory, physicality and much more - together with a sophisticated dinner - bring "the cow to fly". The students turn the guest's stay into a great, round and unique experience that will be remembered forever. The experiences they gain from this will imbuse the students' own creativity and inspire them to actively shape the future of hospitality.
