# New literature for new music



## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

I am sure many of us read relatively modern poems, novels and short stories or watch relatively modern dramas. Are there any modern works in your reading or watching that you feel could (should) inspire great music? It might be made into opera or songs or tone poems or any other form.

I have been reading quite a lot of Roberto Bolano over the last five years (I've read most of his more major works more than once) and always think of music - often quite disturbed music - when I read him. There are others ... but over to you.


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

My girlfriend is always saying that someone needs to make the Game of Thrones/Song of Ice and Fire series into an opera. If done right, I think it might be a smash hit, but there would be a lot of potential for distastefulness if executed poorly.


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## Fabulin (Jun 10, 2019)

_Perfume _by Patrick Süskind could be turned into a magnificent opera
_Foucault's Pendulum _by Umberto Eco possibly into a witty opera bouffe
and if we go a bit back, Isaac Asimov's _Nightfall _would make for a great Straussian symphonic poem


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

Wikipedia as a one-act _opera buffa_. That's my nomination.


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

Enthusiast said:


> Are there any modern works in your reading or watching that you feel could (should) inspire great music?


That's the problem, isn't it? There's plenty of material for operatic or symphonic treatment. There's an enormous dearth of composers who write "great" music these days. Music history is littered with thousands of operas that were mounted for a few performances and then utterly forgotten. There have been hundreds of new operas written in the past 50 years, and other than a couple by Glass, I can't think of any that have captured the hearts and minds of the musical public like Verdi, Puccini, Wagner and that generation. Not that I blame the composers, the audiences (and performers) have gotten lazy, too.


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

was done here

https://www.charleswuorinen.com/operas/haroun-and-the-sea-of-stories/


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## Clouds Weep Snowflakes (Feb 24, 2019)

An interesting thought; is there a Classical variation to Dracula? Disney's Frozen would also make for an interesting twist.


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

Frozen has been done as a musical. The story is essentially a rip-off of Hans Christian Andersen's The Snow Queen, which also has been set as an opera, several times. Dracula has been done as a musical, too. The cast recording isn't terrible at all. Of course, the standard here is Marcsher's Der Vampyr.


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## Eva Yojimbo (Jan 30, 2016)

As far as English literature goes, there have been plenty of great poets from the last ~70 years that I don't think have been set to music: James Merrill, John Ashbery, Geoffrey Hill, Philip Larkin, etc. Ashbery might be difficult given that his better stuff tends to be long, quite dense, and in free verse; but Merrill, Hill, and Larkin have plenty of poems that would be great set to music. One favorite of mine:


> Aubade
> BY PHILIP LARKIN
> 
> I work all day, and get half-drunk at night.
> ...


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## Eva Yojimbo (Jan 30, 2016)

Clouds Weep Snowflakes said:


> An interesting thought; is there a Classical variation to Dracula?


Probably not quite what you mean, but Guy Maddin filmed Dracula as a modern ballet that hearkens back to silent films set to much (pre-existing) classical music (especially Mahler):


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

Elliott Carter did Ashberry






When John Ashbery and I decided to collaborate on a musical work (for which we applied and received a composer-Librettist Grant from the National Endowment for the Arts) I studied various texts he wrote for this project and chose his poem Syringa. This attracted me because of its fascinating, distant, quiet treatment of a familiar, many-sided, affecting subject: Orpheus and the power of music. The idea of accompanying the singer of Ashbery's text with another singer whose part would express the subliminal background that might be evoked in the mind of a reader, very soon suggested itself. Indeed, lines near the poem's end: 'In whose tale are hidden syllables/ Of what happened so long before that' led to the idea that the second singer could have a text that reflects some of the sounds, ideas, and feelings of the Ashbery poem in 'hidden syllables'-the 'hidden syllables' of classical Greek, since the poem is about a classical myth.
The well-known story of Orpheus as referred to in the Ashbery poem ends in a kind of apotheosis, so the entire work is set in the frame of the Orphic cult that grew up around the musician when, after his dismemberment, his head, still singing, floated across the Aegean Sea from Greece to Asia Minor, and its burial place became a shrine.
In this score, the mezzo-soprano sings the Ashbery text while the bass sings fragments of Greek texts chosen by me, starting with the Orphic creation story, including a few lines attributed by Plato to the actual poet, Orpheus. Then, breaking down on the word "immortal," the bass sings a lament for Eurydice. After the intervention of Apollo in the Ashbery poem, the bass presents settings of various lyric fragments from the sixth and fifth centuries B.C. by Mimnermus, Archilochus, Sappho, and Ibycus reflecting aspects of the modern poem. Later, while the mezzo is singing: 'But how late to be regretting,' the bass presents Plato's version of the story: The gods, when Orpheus came to Hades to rescue Eurydice, allowed him to be followed only by her ghost, not by the real person, "because, being a musician, he would not have the courage to die for love."
The remaining Greek draws on Heraclitus about constant change, on the Homeric hymn about music, on a diatribe against Apollo (from Cassandra's madness in the Agamemnon, that puns on the god's name which also means "destroying" in Greek), and ends with a reference to the Orphic cult words soma, sema- body, sign (of the soul).
The score, dedicated to Sir William and Lady Glock, is for mezzo-soprano and bass accompanied by guitar, alto flute, English horn, bass clarinet, bass trombone, piano, violin, viola, 'cello, contrabass, and percussion. It was first performed by Jan de Gaetani (mezzo-soprano) and Thomas Paul (bass) with Speculum Musicae conducted by Harvey Sollberger, at a concert celebrating my seventieth birthday at Tully Hall in New York City on December 10, 1978.


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## Eva Yojimbo (Jan 30, 2016)

^ Thanks very much for that! I'll give a listen as soon as I'm able. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that Ashbery collaborated with Carter given his well-known love of contemporary music and art.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

There’s another relation that music has had with literature - formal. The relation between Boulez’s indeterminacy and un coup de dés n’abolira jamais le hazard. The relation between the mass and Clavier Ubung III. The relation between Kreisleriana and ETA Hoffman. The relation between Barraqué and Broch. Between Cornelius Cardew and Confucius’s The Great Learning.

Has anyone got Ferneyhough’s collected essays? I don’t know how literary he is.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Kilar's soundtrack for the 1992 Dracula movie has some good parts.

But back on topic:

A jazzy opera based on _The Confederacy of Dunces_ could be fun.

We nee a Broadway musical of _The Catcher in the Rye_.

Ginsberg's _Howl_ ought to be set for a percussion ensemble (including a piano) and a rap artist.

Getting more recent...

_The Kite Runner_ might make a good opera.

When someone writes about Brett Kavanaugh, that make make a good opera.

That may be all I've got....


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

Mandryka said:


> There's another relation that music has had with literature - formal. The relation between Boulez's indeterminacy and un coup de dés n'abolira jamais le hazard. The relation between the mass and Clavier Ubung III. The relation between Kreisleriana and ETA Hoffman. The relation between Barraqué and Broch. Between Cornelius Cardew and Confucius's The Great Learning.
> 
> Has anyone got Ferneyhough's collected essays? I don't know how literary he is.


The philosopher Walter Benjamin come up in several works and is the sujbet of his Opera, Shadowtime. Etudes Transcendentales uses poems by Ernst Meister and Alrun Moll


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Ah yes. I'd forgotten about the poems in the transcendental etudes, I think he was primarily inspired by an etching of an alchemist. I believe that he has written a lot on words and music, setting poetry in music, but I've never seen the essays.

Over summer I spent some time trying to make sense of _Un coup de dés n'abolira jamais le hazard_, reading literature about it etc. So far I have completely failed!


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## philoctetes (Jun 15, 2017)

Carter also set Elizabeth Bishop, one of my favorite poets.

I've read 2666 and Nazi Literature in the Americas and the idea of making an opera from Bolano reminds me of the film version of Naked Lunch... which leads me to think of writers like William Gaddis, Nathaniel Mackey, or even the works of someone like Faulkner, Marquez, or Louise Erdrich...

Something like the Carnival Trilogy by Wilson Harris could be an opera of metahistoriacal, metaphysical proportions... like Wagner but based on mythologies of the Americas...

The novels of Steve Erickson also come to mind... such as Rubicon Beach or Tours of the Black Clock.. on the European side, Sleepwalkers by Hermann Broch...


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

philoctetes said:


> I've read 2666 and Nazi Literature in the Americas and the idea of making an opera from Bolano reminds me of the film version of Naked Lunch...


It is not so much opera or music drama (or any other specific form) that I have in mind for Bolano. But whenever I read him I seem to have a vague idea of music in my mind: original music, different music. Its so vague that it is out of reach but I am almost a composer!


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## SuperTonic (Jun 3, 2010)

science said:


> Ginsberg's _Howl_ ought to be set for a percussion ensemble (including a piano) and a rap artist.


It's not for percussion ensemble, but there is a piece for string quartet by composer Lee Hyla. He composed the music to be played over an old recording of Ginsberg giving a reading of Howl. Honestly though, I don't think the music adds very much. For me the most interesting thing about the work is hearing Ginsberg reciting his own work.

Kronos Quartet recorded it back in the '90's.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

SuperTonic said:


> It's not for percussion ensemble, but there is a piece for string quartet by composer Lee Hyla. He composed the music to be played over an old recording of Ginsberg giving a reading of Howl. Honestly though, I don't think the music adds very much. *For me the most interesting thing about the work is hearing Ginsberg reciting his own work.*
> 
> Kronos Quartet recorded it back in the '90's.


I agree completely. It's a joy to hear him.

My favorite work on that album is the one about J. Edgar Hoover. One of the my favorite works for tape, actually.


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

Plays that could be operas:

Beckett's been done, as has Sarah Kane. But I don't think Pinter has. His writing is so musical. Also the mix of terse dialog with extended speeches offers musical opportunities. "Betrayal" is not my favorite play of his, but it might translate the most readily. Or "The Dumbwaiter" - an early one act.

Brian Friel's plays have a gorgeous, lyrical quality. "Dancing at Lughnasa" maybe?

Other recent plays that come to mind:

"August: Osage County"
"The Ferryman"
"King Charles III"
"Sweat"

All of these have strong, often audacious, plot lines.

And for the bold, "Amadeus."


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

I wonder if a strong plot is the only way to write strong plays/operas? Bluebeard's Castle, for example, has little in the way of plot but is a very satisfying work.


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## Eva Yojimbo (Jan 30, 2016)

Enthusiast said:


> I wonder if a strong plot is the only way to write strong plays/operas? Bluebeard's Castle, for example, has little in the way of plot but is a very satisfying work.


Messiaen's Saint François d'Assise challenges that notion as well. I'm guessing many 20th century operas have to various extents.


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

Enthusiast said:


> I wonder if a strong plot is the only way to write strong plays/operas? Bluebeard's Castle, for example, has little in the way of plot but is a very satisfying work.


No, it isn't. My reference to strong plot lines was only intended to describe the four plays listed above it.

"The Dumbwaiter" is more of a situation than a plot. And while "Betrayal" has a plot (backwards), like most Pinter it is more character driven. Thinking about it last night, I would select "Old Times" (my favorite play by Pinter, and one of his most mysterious) for adaptation. And Beckett's "Fin de Partie" has almost no plot. (I haven't seen the opera.) Annie Baker's plays would fit into that category as well.

On the other hand, plays with strong plots offer opportunities for composers. And "August: Osage County" and "The Ferryman" in particular have over-the-top, often melodramatic plots.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

jegreenwood said:


> On the other hand, plays with strong plots offer opportunities for composers. And "August: Osage County" and "The Ferryman" in particular have over-the-top, often melodramatic plots.


OK but why? If you are saying that strong plots are particularly suited to (or even necessary for) opera, what is your reason for saying this?


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

Enthusiast said:


> OK but why? If you are saying that strong plots are particularly suited to (*or even necessary for*) opera, what is your reason for saying this?


When did I say necessary? Please do not put words in my mouth. Especially where I offered examples of potential and existing opera material that was not reliant on strong plots.

Strong, even melodramatic, plots with heightened emotions offer opportunities different from quiet character studies. They seem to work for Verdi and Puccini among others. Even Berg and Janacek (to name a few 20th century composers.) in some case.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

^ Calm down. I'm not putting words into your mouth. I'm trying to understand where you are coming from. I like lots of operas with strong plots but that was not my reason for liking them and I had never thought that having a strong plot was important for an opera to be good theatre. So, I am trying to understand whether (and why) you are mentioning plot. I am particularly baffled because many of your examples are, as you say, not examples with strong plots. But you do mention plots and I feel I would understand more if you were to expand a little on that. I'm not trying to argue or win (or whatever you think I am doing): I am trying to understand and, perhaps, to learn something new.


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

Enthusiast said:


> ^ Calm down. I'm not putting words into your mouth. I'm trying to understand where you are coming from. I like lots of operas with strong plots but that was not my reason for liking them and I had never thought that having *a strong plot was important for an opera *to be good theatre. So, I am trying to understand whether (and why) you are mentioning plot. I am particularly baffled because many of your examples are, as you say, not examples with strong plots. But you do mention plots and I feel I would understand more if you were to expand a little on that. I'm not trying to argue or win (or whatever you think I am doing): I am trying to understand and, perhaps, to learn something new.


What I said was that strongly plotted material, "offer opportunities different from quiet character studies." Heightened emotions provide opportunities for passionate, maybe even bravura singing (or orchestral passages). The question I have about "August: Osage County" and "The Ferryman" is whether they have too much plot. But if Prokofiev can do "War and Peace" . . .

"King Charles III" is a contemporary Royal Family tragedy echoing Shakespeare throughout. Shakespeare has proven to be a pretty good source for opera composers.

"Sweat" is contemporary verisimo ending in violence.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

I think history, biography, and events are a good source, whether or not they exist as literature.


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## Swosh (Feb 25, 2018)

that sounds incredibly exciting, and daunting haha


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