Diatribe Stage: Lucia Joyce // Premonition

Megan O’Neill, soprano
Leanne Fitzgerald, mezzo-soprano
Patrick Zimmerli, soprano saxophone
Nick Roth, alto / tenor saxophones
Jeff Cohen, piano
Derek Whyte, 5-string electric bass
Satoshi Takeishi, drums, percussion, electronics

Patrick Zimmerli Extracts from the opera Lucia Joyce
Satoshi Takeishi Premonition

Diatribe Records presents a NYC double-bill featuring scenes from saxophonist / composer Patrick Zimmerli’s contemporary opera Lucia Joyce alongside new solo work for drums and  electronics by Japanese/American percussionist Satoshi Takeishi.

Lucia Joyce

“When she reaches her full capacity for rhythmic dancing, James Joyce may yet be known as his daughter’s father.” The Paris Review

Carol Loeb Schloss’ biography To Dance in the Wake credits Lucia Joyce with much of the language and texture of her father James’ Finnegans Wake. But the real truth of Lucia’s story will likely be forever unknown. Lucia Joyce, the new opera by saxophonist / composer Patrick Zimmerli treats that not-knowing dramatically, reading the burning of her letters as a final act of silencing. Zimmerli’s sweeping operatic score is inflected of Gaetano Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor and 1920’s Parisian jazz, whilst creating new spaces for improvisation and intricate melodic interweave between voices and saxophones.

Premonition

“A few years ago, a friend of mine, a film director, told me he was working on a new script based on Franz Kafka’s novel The Trial. He already had a short draft and asked me to compose music for it. After reading the novel, I was deeply struck by the disturbing world it depicted and its eerie resonance with the times we live in today, even though it was written over a century ago. Since creating the album Premonition, I have become increasingly curious about the sense of spiritual loss experienced by humanity during that period and its connection to the birth of electronic music. My new solo work is a continuation of this theme.”    Satoshi Takeishi