ANNOUNCING…. the world premiere recording of Curtis K. Hughes's opera about the 2008 Vice Presidential Debate between Sarah Palin and Joe Biden: "SAY IT AIN'T SO, JOE" (a light tragedy)
This chamber opera presents a surreal and fractured musical re-imagining of the debate, in which the original vocal utterances of the two candidates are harmonized and transformed into operatic melody, with fantastical digressions and glimpses of other contemporaneous events and personalities, including Hillary Clinton and Joe "the Plumber" Wurzelbacher.
featuring the original cast of the 2009 premiere production by GUERILLA OPERA
"DANGER GARDEN" - exciting new ensemble music by Curtis K. Hughes, featuring performances by the nationally acclaimed FIREBIRD ENSEMBLE, recent winners of the CMAcclaim Award presented by Chamber Music America.
The CD includes the Firebird's interpretations of three works, including "danger garden," a volatile, colorful instrumental work inspired by botanical experiments gone awry, recently described as a "little winner"in the Boston Globe and as "engagingly lively" in the Boston Phoenix. Also, "The Beck Journals" Volumes 1 and 2, featuring soprano Jennifer Ashe, presents introspective settings of diary entries by the late painter Rosemarie Beck as she copes with the male-dominated New York art world of the 1950s.
The CD also features the expansive textural colors of "Myopia 2" for a virtuoso group of 12 saxophones, and the politically charged intensity of "National Insecurity," composed during the run-up to US military action in Iraq of the past decade.
