eight devised scenes for six players
(flute, 2 clarinets, alto saxophone, guitar and cello)
November 2010; 15’
Premiere: 3 students and the composer, University of York recital, 13th December 2010
This work is a music-theatre reimagining of Medea Fragments. The aim was to condense material from the theatre production so as to allow the musicians to embody characters; in a sense, abstracting the play’s narrative material. Consequently, this piece is a sequence of devised scenes, whose subtitles are taken from Kenneth McLeish’s translation:
fawning – “This house is dead.” – women’s cunning
– exile – “evil on every side” – cold meat –
grief begins (“to prove your love”) – what mortals dream