Performance art has been the traditional, natural extension of the writer’s words. This workshop teaches authors how to produce an aural and reading experience via print-on-demand CD and book combos in several easy-to-understand steps. Drawing from the history of lyricism, in which ancient Greek poets sang their verses to avid audiences, author, composer, and performer Jeri Hilderley and author, publisher, performer Janet Mayes share their experience of making poetry available to contemporary ...
Performance art has been the traditional, natural extension of the writer’s words. This workshop teaches authors how to produce an aural and reading experience via print-on-demand CD and book combos in several easy-to-understand steps. Drawing from the history of lyricism, in which ancient Greek poets sang their verses to avid audiences, author, composer, and performer Jeri Hilderley and author, publisher, performer Janet Mayes share their experience of making poetry available to contemporary audiences the way poetry is often meant to be shared. Audiences, who savor the performance word and can’t always get to coffee houses for live events or find what they want on Youtube, can enjoy breath-taking presentations of literature in such book and CD collaborations.
Using Sappho as their muse, these groundbreaking lesbians from the 70’s explore the interconnections of lyrical language with translations, music, technology, and ecstatic love. Hilderley’s music to Konstantinos Lardas’ translations, first performed for LGBTQ audiences in the late 70s, are incorporated into a colorful ‘two gems in a jewel case.’ Hilderley and Mayes chronicle the genesis of their CD, Time Traveling with Sappho: a Love-Song Cycle, and collectors’ reference book (a compilation of essays, translations, scores, libretto, images of Sappho and her original poem fragments in Ancient Greek). They share their experience in shaping this complex, layered creation: a beautiful object people can hold in their hands, take home, and then play, read and enjoy, feeling connected in their own way to a great Greek lyricist poet-singer, wise-woman from the Isle of Lesbos – Sappho, the quintessential first known OutWrite poetess. Who else would be the muse of this 21st Century project?
Jeri Hilderley & Janet Mayes
seawavestudio@earthlink.net
SeawaveRecordings.com
WordSpacePublications.com
