Half Man Half Goat

Description

In the early 1990s I composed a work for clarinet and piano entitled ‘The Revenge of Marsyas’ which was a very political work inspired by the ancient Greek legend of Apollo, Marsyas and the theft of the ‘gift’ of music.  All of which I discovered whilst working as Music Director on ‘The Trackers of Oxyrinchus’ at the National Theatre Studio.  What I loved about this play, by Tony Harrison, was the brilliant use of comedy for dramatic effect.  And that is what I’ve tried to bring to these two works.  In Cabaret Song we have the rather comic antics of Marsyas and his fellow Satyrs then, in Marsyas Dances, the main protagonist – represented by the clarinet –  performs a dance that celebrates the liberation of music from the Gods, so that it can be shared amongst the rest of society.  It didn’t end well for Marsyas, but at least the rest of us get to keep the music!