OVERVIEW

This performance is a part of the festival NODO / New Opera Days Ostrava 2018

Texts: Henry David Thoreau, Norman O. Brown, Erik Satie, Marcel Duchamp, Buckminster Fuller, Merce Cunningham, Marshall McLuhan among others

Song Books (1970) is a voluminous collection of solo compositions. The first book includes solos 3 to 58, the second book goes from 59 to 92 and the third one contains performance instructions. The solos fall into four categories: 1) for voice, 2) for voice and electronics, 3) theatrical action, 4) actions with electronics. Any subset of the individual solos may be chosen and their performance may overlap without restriction. Despite great freedom offered by the multifarious types of notation and instructions used, the solos are very tricky to perform, since they require a passionate, but also highly restrained, selfless approach. Song Books may be considered a work of musical surrealism, but one devoid of any psychoanalytical aspects. More