07-16-2010, 11:00 PM
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#18 (permalink)
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The Reforms
Location: Rarely, if ever, here or there, but always in transition
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excerpts: unabridged operatic scene + interlude
Einstein on the Beach [Opera]: Knee (Play) 2, composed by Philip Glass; conducted by David Anchel.
Relevant History:
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Primer
Einstein on the Beach is an opera that premiered on July 25, 1976 at the Avignon Festival in France, scored and written by Philip Glass, and designed and directed by theatrical producer Robert Wilson.
This was Glass's first and longest opera score, taking approximately five hours; given the length of the opera, the audience atendees were free to enter and leave as they desired.
Einstein's musical score became the first in a loosely related thematic trilogy, followed by Satyagraha (1980) and Akhnaten (1983). These three operas were described by Glass as "portrait" operas that portray men whose personal vision transformed the thinking of their times through the power of ideas rather than by military force.
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Synopsis
From the beginning of Glass and Wilson's collaboration, they insisted on portraying the icon purely as a historical figure and not with any storyline attached to his image. While they did incorporate symbols from Einstein's life within the opera's scenery, characters, and music, they intentionally did not choose to give the opera a specific plot. Propelling idea of "non-plot" within Einstein on the Beach, its libretto employs solfege syllables, numbers, and short sections of poetry. In an interview, Glass comments that he originally intended for his audience to construct personal connections with both Einstein as a character and also with the music with that he assigns to the icon. For example, the music within the first of the opera's "Knee Plays" features repeated numbers accompanied by an electric organ. Glass states that these numbers and solfege syllables were used as placeholders for texts by the singers to memorize their parts, and were kept instead of replacing them with texts.
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+ bonus
I Feel the Earth Move, composed by Philip Glass; poem by Christopher Knowles.
Quote:
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"I Feel the Earth Move" is the third section in the Trial 2/Prison section of the opera. The section is written in the same style as the rest of the opera, but has an instrumentation of soprano saxophone and bass clarinet, omitting the electronic keyboard used in most of the segments in Einstein on the Beach. A poem by Christopher Knowles is read over the musical soprano saxophone and bass clarinet line and in the poem's meanderings, it mentions such "TV personalities" as David Cassidy. A shortened version of this piece was chosen along with three other selections from Einstein on the Beach to appear on another Philip Glass album Songs from the Trilogy, which also included selections from Glass's operas Satyagraha and Akhnaten. The section's title is a reference to a Carole King song of the same name, from her album Tapestry.
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(for those keen enough to perceive, I featured the opening to act II of Einstein on the Beach, and as fitting for the bonus track, it just happened to be the closing scene to the second act's play: veritable bookend excerpts of music to the aim.)
[ wiki.]
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As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world (that is the myth of the Atomic Age) as in being able to remake ourselves. —Mohandas K. Gandhi
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