RECORDS //
Britten - Rorem
The first performance of RECORDS,
designed and defined by Benjamin Britten and Ned Rorem songs for soprano and piano.
Two paintings were created during the performance of 3 songs from Benjamin Britten and Alexander Pushkin’s cycle “The Poet’s Echo” and Ned Rorem and Howard Moss’s song “See How They Love Me”. On the topic of unrequited love, this performance of RECORDS shared english songs from both an American and British compositional perspective.
Intending to represent both the color of the music and the arch of the story relayed in the music’s text this performances of RECORDS generated two mixed media paintings on canvas.
Amanda Austin
creator, soprano, visual artist
Taisiya Pushkar
pianist
Jonathan Estabrooks
videographer
Jack Eubanks
photographer
Cheyenne Sykes
lighting designer
Greer X
lighting assistant
Elise Walters
stage manager
The Poet's Echo
Echo
From leafy woods the savage howl,
A distant horn, the thunder’s roll,
A maiden singing up the hill,
To every sound
Your answering cry the air doth fill In quick rebound.
You listen for the thunder’s voice,
The ocean wave’s wild stormy noise,
The distant mountain-shepherd’s cries
You answer free; To you comes no reply.
Likewise O poet, to thee!
My Heart
My heart, I fancied it was over,
That road of suffering and pain,
And I resolved: “Tis gone for ever, Never again! never again!
That ancient rapture and its yearning,
The dreams, the credulous desire… But now old wounds have started burning Inflamed by beauty and her fire.
Angel
In the doorway of Eden a gentle angel, with head adroop, was shining.
but a dark and rebellious demon was flying over the abyss of hell.
The spirit of denial, the spirit of doubt gazed at the spirit pure,
and an involuntary heat of tenderness he dimly experienced for the first time.
"Forgive," he said,
"You I saw, And not for nothing were you shining for me: not everything in heaven have I hated. not everything in the world have I despised.”
by Alexander Pushkin
See How They Love Me
by Alexander Pushkin
See how they love me – green leaf, gold grass,
swearing my blue wrists tick and are timeless.
See how it moves me – old sea, blue sea,
curving a half-moon round to surround me.
See how it loves me – high sky, blue sky,
letting the light be kindled to warm me.
But you rebuke me, oh Love –
Love that I only pursue.
See how they love me.
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"The Poet's Echo" // Britten - Pushkin, 2019
mixed media painting on canvas
120" x 60"
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"See How They Love Me" // Rorem - Moss, 2019
mixed media painting on canvas
120" x 60"
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