ARTicles vol. 2 i.3b: Tragic Song

A composer and musician of international renown, Evan Ziporyn is Head of Music and Theatre Arts at M.I.T. As a clarinetist with the Bang on a Can All-Stars he has toured over a dozen countries and worked with such composers as Meredith Monk, Tan Dun, and Steve Reich. His compositions have been played by many leading ensembles, including the Kronos Quartet, Bang on a Can, and Gamelan Sekar Jaya.

Gideon Lester: The music that you’re writing for Oedipus marks your first composition for the stage. Why did the project appeal to you?

Evan Ziporyn: I’m attracted to the play. Oedipus is archetypal and elemental, like a force of nature. We don’t respond to Sophocles in the way that we do even with Shakespeare; it exists in the core of our being. The play is inscrutable. In most drama it’s clear who the heroes are, who the villains. In Oedipus those polarities don’t exist – in a sense there is no drama in it. Everyone knows the story, both the audience and the characters in the play. Even Oedipus knows the facts – he just has to put the pieces together. There are no great revelations. It’s not a question of whether what happens to him is justified or not, whether he deserved it. The barriers of time and language that separate us from the original play are so great that the decisions we make in approaching it are more fundamental than that. When I read the play I felt that I could undertake the same type of excavation as when I’m writing absolute music – an investigation into unknown territory. It’s not as if I have to write happy or funny music because it’s a happy or funny play; it’s rather a chance to explore my own relationship with this seminal text.

G.L.: How did you plan the music for Oedipus?

E.Z.: I began by trying to understand the nature of the ritual of theatre – both in Sophocles’ time and today. Performance is a structured, ritualistic act, which has replaced religion for many of us. Like religion it is built on codes and assumptions; when you go into a theatre or a concert, there are ways that you are expected to feel and act. This struck me when thinking about Oedipus. If we know what’s going to happen, why are we watching it? Why perform it? What is actually taking place – not in terms of the story, but the people gathered in the theatre? It’s not an easy question to face, because there’s an aspect of ritual murder to it. Oedipus is a play about finding a scapegoat, a human sacrifice. Thebes is sick and there’s only one way to heal it. From that point of view a performance of the play is related to the rites that preceded tragic drama in many cultures. That was my starting point in thinking about the music.

G.L.: How did that sense of ritual translate into a musical form?

E.Z.: I wanted it to be elemental, to involve raw sounds – from raw beauty to raw noise. The cello, for example, can be beautiful or primal, particularly if we apply electronics to it. I wanted to strip the music down, so that when you listen to it you have a sense of ripping something open. As the music pervades the space you feel close to the core of emotion. I started with that general idea, then began more specifically to respond to Sophocles’ lines.

G.L.: The Chorus will be singing in Greek. Why?

E.Z.: The sounds of Greek have mythical connotations. If you say the word “thanatos” instead of “death,” the meaning evoked is much larger, even if no one understands the text directly. It’s about the magic of the words. The choruses will be somewhat fragmented, but meaning won’t be a problem because we’ll translate the text in supertitles or the actors’ speech.

G.L.: How are you orchestrating the music?

E.Z.: The instruments are mainly Western – cello, guitar, bass, some electronic sampling – but the percussion is non-Western; a Javanese gong, metal bars, Chinese drums, and several homemade instruments. I’ve spent a lot of time working with non-Western instruments and singers, and Robert shares my interest in heterophonic music, which blends elements from different traditions. The members of the Chorus are classically trained opera singers, but we’re also working with I Nyoman Catra, who is Indonesian and sings in a traditional Balinese style. Although he, like the Chorus, will sing in Greek, his vocal quality is completely different. He sings in different scales and improvises, and I’m trying to provide space for what he does naturally.

G.L.: Once you had established a tone and instrumentation, how did you proceed?

E.Z.: I studied the structure of the play. I made diagrams of the length of each scene, charting how long each character is on stage, and looking for connections and patterns that aren’t evident from the narrative alone. The komos [dialogue between the Chorus and protagonist], for example, is very important. There are two of them in Oedipus, and the second, at the end of the play, must somehow be musically related to the first, though it can’t simply be a recasting of the same material. In this production the komos may almost feel like a dialogue inside Oedipus’ head, so that the music serves as a door to unspoken parts of the play.

G.L.: What else did you discover from examining the play’s structure?

E.Z.: The climax comes unusually early. Everyone knows that Oedipus discovers the truth and blinds himself, but that’s not the end of the play. I’m learning how important the remaining material is. The final fifth of the play is surprising. If you read the language closely, you find that Oedipus reaches a certain quietude, a sense of assurance, as he explains his actions. The critic Bernard Knox pointed out that self-assurance is a consistent part of Oedipus’ character. From the beginning of the play he knows exactly what he must do, even when the time comes to blind himself. His explanation for that act, and for his emotional and spiritual struggle, seems to me the most profound passage in the play. Oedipus is often compared to Hamlet, but he is also Job. I’m trying to find a way to express his newfound quietude in music, but also to have it implicit before he blinds himself. It’s as if it’s all already in place, and is now brought out in a different way. Elements that we thought meant one thing musically come to mean something else later on.

Gideon Lester is the A.R.T.’s Associate Artistic Director. Find more about Evan Ziporyn and listen to an archive of his music at www.ziporyn.com.