PROGRAM NOTE

Last modified 11 July 2024

KNOWING / NOT KNOWING (2022-2024)

Narrator, recorded voices, mixed chorus, 2 percussion, trombone, actor,
8-channel sound and video projections

by Roger Reynolds

What can an individual “know”? What seems out of reach? How does knowing come about? More basically, what does it mean to “know” something? These issues occupy philosophers in ways that most of us can’t follow. Yet, in everyday life, one faces such questions constantly. At particular moments one notices friction between the smooth evolution of thought or feeling that one welcomes and the perplexity aroused by actual events, by the unexpected opinions of others. A desired clarity is muddled. Living in this world of disrupted comfort, and being increasingly disturbed by what seems not only unlikely, but rather unthinkable  – one may be unable to hold a thought and its implications together in one’s mind. The very idea of what is “reason-about-able” has been eroded. “Reasoned consideration” is no longer a reliable guide.

KNOWING / NOT KNOWING  Stage 1 is a multi-media work for actor, a trombonist and percussionists, computer processed sound, a cappella choir, and a novel “kaleidoscopic chorus” that gives voice to the community in which the work is performed. Projected imagery further dimensionalizes a 90-mninte experience. The work’s text passes through nine sections beginning with Infancy and Individuation and ending with Communality and Knowledge. It is a montage of more than two dozen sources ranging from ancient Persian and Indian wisdom, through the contemporary voices of Chinua Achebe, Wallace Stevens, James Baldwin, Simone Weil, Albert Camus, Amanda Gorman, Carlo Rovelli, David Brooks, Toni Morrison and many others. Although their perspectives span time and arise out of the living of contrasted lives, the composite weave feels natural: many voices speaking as one about how we all could view life:  Trust … implies a willingness to depend on another. Compassion … is a miracle more astonishing than walking on water.  Make yourself into an agent … consistent, unified and whole. Every human being is a miracle.
 
Experiencing KNOWING in its first stage not only introduces one to a copious array of observations, but also frames and interconnects their content with a central musical line that stems from the world of lullabies: a mother singing to her child. Computer technologies allow individual phrases, nested dialogues, and shared ruminations to move choreographically around the audience’s space. What an audience member experiences includes the literal voices of the community speaking back to the work with its own voice.

KNOWING / NOT KNOWING was premiered at UC San Diego’s Park&Market, 17 March 2024.

– Roger Reynolds