ODD OCTOBER - Day 7 Lets zip forward 150 years to another operatic work. In 1975, Philip Glass, perhaps the most famous composer from the school of minimalism—which attempts to uncover the beauty in repetition and slight variation—wrote Einstein on the Beach, an opera in four acts and by far one of his longest works. We call Einstein on the Beach an opera largely because we have no better name for what it is. There isnt much traditional opera in the work: there is no plot; the singers seem to represent specific thematic threads more than characters; and seemingly orthodox structural and performance vocabulary like scene and aria seem to take on a different meaning. Perhaps the most interesting parts of the work are its Knee Plays, connecting tissue between the acts that combine a chant-like choral pattern with highly rhythmic human narration for an ethereal effect. The unexpected moments of synchronicity between the two parts create a strangely paradoxical feeling of serene disorientation. quoted from Lawrence, N.B. from 10 Really weird pieces of classical music. mentalfloss/article/54441/10-really-weird-pieces-classical-music
Posted on: Wed, 22 Oct 2014 19:09:39 +0000