Language ,as a Music; Dec. 3, 2004.

This first performance of Language ,as a Music featured me, speaker, Marcus Macauley, piano, and Chelsea Bonagura, soprano.
The concert took place at the Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester, NY, at 8pm on December 3 2004.
The audience was a good audience, and featured the author of the work, Benjamin Boretz. Also in attendance were Ellen Koskoff, Ivan Latko, Nathan Schmidt, Marco Alunno, David Plylar, and Josh Mailman.
Not many comments about the performance afterward, but Boretz did mention that my reading...what was the wording...emphasized 'meaning'...or maybe, just what I thought the meaning was. Ellen Koskoff and I talked briefly about the "sound" of the words, and how listening to just the sound, regardless of meaning, was nearly a poetic experience (my remembrance, maybe not her words). I mention to her that, at first, I had thought Boretz meant, metaphorically, that language could be "like" music, "sounding" musical....
The performance weant well, and everyone was pleased with the live performance, by Marcus and Chelsea, of the "Argument," part 2, and the opening to "Red Hook," part 4. I was most worried, by the way, of how "Red Hook" would come off, since this part of the piece seemed most difficult, but after this first performance I felt that the first section, "Thesis," deserves yet more attention regarding delivery.