It was in 1973 that Copi (Argentinean born playwright Raul Damonte Botana, 1939-1987) published his Les quatre jumelles (The Four Binoculars), a play which is, like its predecessors (La Journee d'une reveuse, Eva Peron, etc.), part of the legacy of the Theater of the Absurd, which first appeared in the 1950s with the plays of Adamov, Beckett and Ionesco. Indeed, all these works share in the rejection of realism, a lack of plot and their focus on tragicomedy. As for the basics of Les quatre jumelles: in an imaginary Alaskan town, the Goldwashing sisters, gold diggers in search of work, meet the Smith sisters, with whom begins a relentless fight to the death. In this closeted burlesque, dominated by the figure of a towering transvestite, Copi plays casually with transgressions (drugs, the most trivial insults, etc) as stereotypes of the most minor genres (the juvenile delinquent Goldwashing sisters are worthy of the most out of date soap opera). From this source, more than thirty years later, Regis Campo draws his comic opera in one act - what some have called "a genre which reinvents the current trend in contemporary French opera". Watch an excerpt from Regis Campo's Les Quatre Jumelles, with "sopranist" Fabrice di Falco and Ensemble TM+, Laurent Cuniot conducting . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.

Even if Luciano Berio's Circles (1960) - based on three poems by e. e. cummings - points to the major musical interests of its time, in particular the use of a text's phonetic traits, its truly innovative qualities lie in the way the study of simple development, based on a physical analogy between the phonetic and instrumental material, is carried out to the benefit of a deeper exploration of all aspects of linguistic and musical organization. In this sense, the text is a base line from which all else can be derived, and to which everything can be traced back. Circles is the result of a convergence between a type of literature that achieves a "musical" autonomy (Joyce's Finnegans Wake is one extreme case) and an explosion of traditional forms and a type of music which attempts, by means of the structures of spoken language, to win back the characteristics of all language, whether musical or linguistic [note thanks to Jacques Demierre]. Watch a performance of Berio's Circles, played by the Fredonia Retro Ensemble . . . it's our FEATURED SOUND ART for the week.

According to composer Nancy Bloomer Deussen, Carmel by-the Sea was originally the middle movement of a larger work entitled Rustic Sketches which was composed in 1987 for the Oakland Chamber Orchestra. Unfortunately, the Oakland Chamber Orchestra never actually performed the work, as the orchestra went bankrupt that same year, and eventually folded before the work's premiere. The Nova Vista Symphony, with conductor Emily Ray, gave the work its first performance in 1987. Deussen spent much time over her Rustic Sketches and eventually decided to revise its first and last movements. At the same time, she concluded that the middle movement was exactly right and could stand on its own as a separate orchestral work. Originally entitled At Water's Edge, she renamed it Carmel by-the Sea and added it to her works for orchestra. At its core, it is a musical watercolor that depicts the beautiful seaside town of Carmel by-the-Sea, California." Listen to a performance of Nancy Bloomer Deussen's Carmel by-the Sea . . . it's one of our PYTHEAS EARFULS for the week.

Iva Bittova is a Czech avant-garde violinist, singer and composer of Romani ethnicity. She began her career as an actress in the mid 1970s, appearing in several of Czech feature films, but switched to playing violin and singing in the early 1980s. She started recording in 1986, and by 1990 her unique
vocal and instrumental technique gained her international recognition. Since then, she has performed regularly all over Europe, the United States and Japan, and has made more than eight solo albums. In addition to her musical career, Bittova has continued acting and still occasionally appears in feature films. In 2003 she played the part of Zena in Zelary, a film nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 2004 Academy Awards. Critics from all over the world try, often unsuccessfully, to classify Bittova. Some say she is like Meredith Monk, others call up Laurie Anderson, or even Diamanda Galas. But Bittova - drawing from a well of pure natural talent and Gypsy-Jewish blood - is an individual, outstanding performer, composer and actress. "Though well-known from her entrancing recordings, Bittova is more of a marvel in person. Physically slight and wearing a red cocktail dress, she emits an incredibly improbable combination of sounds with pinpoint precision, as casually as most people would a folk song or nursery rhyme. Imagine Minnie Ripperton as a chattering fairy or Meredith Monk on helium gas. Always ... she seemed to operate from some musical ground zero - one that also puts you in touch with the most elemental purpose of music, and why you first came to love it" [notes thanks to The Philadelphia Inquirer]. Watch Iva Bittova perform her Divna Slecinka (A Strange Young Lady) (1996) with the Netherlands Wind Ensemble . . . it's this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.