Cantata for a Nuclear Age - Video now online

On April 30 Mark Vuorinen and the Toronto Choral Artists premiered This Ravelled Dust, my new cantata about nuclear proliferation and the Garden of Eden.

A video of the performance is now online, along with audio samples, plot highlights, and the complete libretto (which you can scroll through as you watch the video).

http://www.robinsonmcclellan.com/ThisRavelledDust

We hear often about the practical and political problems of nuclear weapons and nuclear power. But it's just as important to address these issues in terms of ethics, the human spirit, and the myths and religious symbols that underlie contemporary Western culture. In developing nuclear energy, we have opened something that can never be closed again, and we need to deal with our collective feelings about that. This piece borrows imagery from the Old Testament to explore this very current dilemma.

If that's all a bit too heavy for you, just bask in the luxuriant music (if I do say so myself), and the sumptuous, subtle use of the English language (thanks to Robin Muir-Miller, the poet). Also, I stole some ideas from Benjamin Britten, so if you like his music you might like this piece. And you might enjoy hunting for the quotations from Handel's Messiah scattered throughout - see if you can find them all! (hint, not all are sung).

Enjoy!

Robinson McClellan