iOrpheusart among us

About The Chronicler. He is in the music, talking, listening, performing. He is a character who exists only when the music is playing. The music calls him into the moment, which is the present, and always tuned to a real and fictional or mythic moment in what he calls Great Time. In other words, music is always playing. The Chronicler realizes that he is a witness, but is uncertain about what he is experiencing and what he should say. He was a witness, but he should not have been, he often remarks, like you.

In myth, everything signifies, everything causes wonder. The story of Orpheus and Eurydice seems to have something to do with the surface of the earth, or at least the dividing line or boundaries between realms. The first hint is that Eurydice is bitten on her ankle.

Performing myth means reading as much as possible about it and flowing with the surprises. In Ovid's Metamorphosis, for example, there is no direct mention of a wedding ceremony, or that the couple even consummated their marriage. In Book X (translation by Rolfe Humphries) a seer, Hymen, arrives, after being called by Orpheus. It is clear that Orpheus is a musician, but not one of particular glory. The seer sees no lucky omens. Eurydice, who is referred to as a bride, Ovid says, "went walking/Across the lawn, attended by her naiads/A serpent bit her ankle/and she was gone." That quickly.

In the production of iOrpheus, the performers did not play the role of specific characters. The dancers, singers, storyteller, theatre troupe, musicians in the different ensembles, and the audience and onlookers were at once Orpheus, Eurydice, the underworld, the events of the myth, the total landscape of its occurrence and the sites of its walking, telling, recollection. Walking iOrpheus reveals that walking is essential to the entire story. Walking iOrpheus reveals that walking is essential to the narrative and its meaning.

When performed outdoors, with spectators surrounding the players, multiple dimensions of the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice become as significant as the characters and the storyline. A wedding takes place: we are all there. She is bitten by a snake and dies. As narrative, or drama, this is tragic and is conveyed in painful, emotional music, with facial expressions and gesture. The songs of Orpheus and the laments of the guests are of profound grief and sadness.

The story of Orpheus and Eurydice is simple to tell but as complicated to explain as love, death, music, fate. As with all myths, every telling is a version that adds or omits details, a few of which can make all the difference. Orpheus, the first musician, plays the lyre, is able to tame animals, move even the trees and rocks. Eurydice, his bride, takes a walk or just wanders into the fields, or, perhaps, is led there by the shepherd, Aristaeus, who may have been a former lover. A snakebite. Death. Inconsolable and grieving, Orpheus plays for himself and to the living.

Performance speaks. Music is time and the joy and complexity of sensuous reflection. Myths are meant to be lived. And shared. Performing the story of Orpheus and Eurydice in a walking opera, a processional re-enactment, a quiet spectacle, outdoors, by a river, there, with witnesses, releases the layers of its meanings and the unknowable signs within it.

It’s the morning after, and the iOrpheus performance was breathtakingly beautiful, if I do say so, with hundreds of park visitors watching as the story of Orpheus and Eurydice unfolded in space and time before their eyes. There are, of course, a multitude of people to thank for their gifts of music, expertise, and time—performers, directors, technical staff, and administrative personnel—all of whom will be acknowledge on this site and elsewhere in the days and weeks to come. For the moment, however, thanks from both Nora and me to all of you. But one of the groups who should be acknowledged today for making the spectacle spectacular are the members of the physical theatre troupe, Zen Zen Zo, who recreated the myth in butoh-style. I’ll be writing about them at more length when I’ve had a chance to process all I've heard and seen. In the meantime, here’s a photo of Zen Zen Zo in Act 3, The River, in the midst of Crossing Styx.

It’s a couple of hours before iOrpheus begins, and if anyone deserves credit, up front, for getting the production off the ground, keeping it moving, and making it soar, it’s our Project Manager, Sue Punshon. A composition student at the Con herself, Sue is a calm, competent, level head in the middle of all the madness and chaos. Time and again, she has found the money when the coffers were empty, located the equipment that didn’t exist, and calmed the ruffled feathers a project such as iOrpheus is bound to cause from time to time.

It’s the day before the performance, a day we’ve been anticipating for over two years, and I’ve spent it walking the parklands with the various groups of performers who will take part. I know the parklands pretty well by now, Nora and I must have walked it a hundred times, not to mention looking at it in Google Earth for a year before that.