200! This is the 200th monthly episode of PoemTalk. To mark the occasion, we celebrated Evie Shockley with a day of events and recordings and conversation and it was all informally dubbed “Evie Day.” Before a live audience in the Arts Café of KWH we talk about two of Evie’s poems: “My last modernist poem, #4 (or, re-re-birth of a nation)” from The New Black; and “studies in antebellum literature (or, topsy-turvy)” from Semi-automatic. Evie’s expansive PennSound page happens to include recordings of her performing both of these poems, but since we were feeling the honor of having Evie there with us in person, we asked her if she wouldn’t mind reading these poems. She did, and you'll be hearing them as part of the PoemTalk discussion after the introductions. It was the annual gathering of a group that had been meeting for some years: Aldon Nielsen, William J. Harris, and the late and much-missed Tyrone Williams.
October 11, 2024
'Brian Ferneyhough Complete Piano Works, Nicolas Hodges Piano'
This two CD-set is just out from Neos, with Hodges joined at one point by Rolf Hind. The collection includes Hodges's stunning vocal performance of "Opus Contra Naturum" from Shadowtime (for which Ferneyough wrote the first part and I wrote the other two parts). All newly recorded for this release. Worth a journey: it is a journey. The CD booklet includes notes by the composer on each piece and an overview by Fabrice Fitch. I wrote this work for the CD cover.