Radio Opera with Gregory Whitehead and Yvette Janine Jackson

Apr 05, 2019: 12pm- 1:30 pm
Distler Hall @ Granoff Music Center

Tufts University | Medford, MA 02155
https://as.tufts.edu/music/about/musicCenter

All are welcome to join this event on Tuft’s Medford campus featuring an introductory presentation by Gregory Whitehead, a revelatory exploration of radio space as a context for understanding radio opera in relationship to the radiobody. Yvette Janine Jackson will present a 45 minute program featuring three of her radio opera works, including Invisible People (A Radio Opera): Episode One -Deliverance. Jackson's Invisible People is a series of compositions based on the negative outpouring that followed Barack Obama's approval of marriage equality and the silence of the invisible people whose voices were excluded from the media. The "libretto" is from found text from sources including sermons, speeches, religious literature, reparation therapy brochures, and internet trolls.

Audience Q&A with the artists to follow.

Gregory Whitehead is an internationally influential and acclaimed radiomaker, audio artist, sound poet, singer of tales and media philosopher. Traversing more than four decades, his work celebrates radiophonic space as an infinite medium of poetic navigation and free association.

Yvette Janine Jackson is a composer of electroacoustic, chamber, and orchestral musics for concert, theatre, and installation. Building on her experience as a theatrical sound designer, she blends various forms into her own aesthetic of radio opera that draws from history to examine relevant social issues..

This event is part of two days of activities celebrating the culmination of the 2018/2019 academic year-long "Wave Farm (in residence) at Tufts University Art Galleries".