Your Money My Life Goodbye (1999)

Přidal: Přemek |

Červenec 24, 2006

Robert Ashley. Původní rozhlasová hra – rozhlasová opera
v původním znění. Režie Robert Ashley

Osoby a obsazení:
Robert Ashley (hlas),
Sam Ashley (kontratenor),
Thomas Buckner (baryton),
Jacqueline Humbert (soprán),
Joan La Barbara (soprán),
Thomas Hamilton (elektronické nástroje).

Styl: Minimalismus, Moderní kompozice.

Natočeno: Bayern 2, 1999. Vysílání 21. 7. 2006 (64 min.).

Opera, televizní drama, rozhlasová hra : americký skladatel Robert Ashley míchá media i typy. „Your Money My Life Goodbye“ provedené v americkém originále slučuje strukturu opery a televizního drama v rozhlasovou hru. Jeho práce jsou koncipovány jako interdisciplinární projekty, které při elektronické tvorbě zvuku a zvláště v americké řeči a způsobu provedení zní mimořádně.

„Your Money My Life Goodbye“ je jedním ze 49 sborových kusů (děl), které mohou být použity mnoha způsoby v mnoha kombinacích jako divadelní opera či pro rozhlas nebo televizi.
Souhrnně nesou název „The Immortality Songs“.Jsou-li prováděny jako jednotlivé dílo, mají svůj vlastní název. Sedm kompozic mám již hotovo. Již žijí svým vlastním životem a proto již mají svůj vlastní název.“ (Robert Ashley)

Opera ‚Your Money My Life Goodbye‘ byla vydána na CD u firmy Lovely Music.

YOUR MONEY MY LIFE GOODBYE
Robert Ashley

An opera commissioned by Bayerisher Rundfunk Munich’s Hörspiel und Medienkunst department about an internationally renowned swindler, who almost took down the European and American banking system. Featuring the voices of Robert Ashley, Sam Ashley, Thomas Buckner, Jackie Humbert, and Joan La Barbara. Recorded and mixed by Tom Hamilton.

Your Money My Life Goodbye is one of forty-nine vocal-ensemble pieces of various lengths (from 10 minutes to 90 minutes or more) that can be used in many kinds of combinations to make an opera for stage, for radio or for television. Any of the combinations go under the title of the „opera,“ The Immortality Songs. When any of the pieces are performed separately, as in Your Money My Life Goodbye for Bayerischer Rundfunk, they take their individual titles. I have finished seven of the compositions. It looks like a lifetime of work. Hence, the title.

In all of the forty-nine compositions some aspect of the musical structure (or many aspects of the musical structure) derive directly from the English language of the libretto. This process of derivation can be secretive and arcane (the music based, for instance, on grammatical structures or on the probability of the recurrence of certain syllables) or, as in Your Money My Life Goodbye, open and obvious. I think that the open and obvious approach – in this case, matching the syllables of the English (and the German) to the rhythm of the title-line, and matching the voice choices to the occurrence of the „characters“ in the text – is a good solution to the „light-hearted“ nature of the text.

The story is simple. A woman responds to an invitation to attend a high-school reunion by sending her son, because she is incapacitated for some unknown reason. In describing her son, we get the idea that he is a high-level „intelligence agent“ (a spy). A sort of James Bond character. The woman writes that her son’s wife will not attend the reunion, because she is recently dead, either from suicide or murder. The son’s wife is described in great detail from various newspaper articles. She was an internationally renowned swindler, who almost took down the European and American banking system. She was a successful entrepreneur. Your Money My Life Goodbye doesn’t take this seriously at all. Everybody is crazy. — Robert Ashley, 1998.