From: roger@quantime.co.uk (Roger Phillips)
Newsgroups: soc.motss
Subject: The Sound of Music
Date: 29 Sep 92 19:42:09 GMT
Reply-To: roger@quantime.co.uk (Roger Phillips)
Organization: Quantime Ltd, London (software for market research)

Last night, I went to a wonderful concert by the Kronos Quartet.
Among the pieces they played which were written for them
was one called _All the Rage_, by Bob Ostertag.

From the programme notes:
P Of this piece, Ostertag writes:
P O  _All the Rage_ was developed from a recording I made
P O  of a riot in San Francisco in October, 1991, which
P O  followed California Governor Pete Wilson's veto of a
P O  bill designed to protect gays and lesbians from
P O  discrimination.

[I wonder if I heard any of _your_ voices last night?]

The performance started with a recorded voice (Eric Gupton)
speaking a libretto [that's what they called it in the programme]
(by Sara Miles) which began "The first time someone said queer...".
Sometimes for several minutes the tape played
while the players were silent.

P O  First I sifted through the recording and isolated
P O  those sections that to my ear suggested music.  Some
P O  of these involved screaming, whistles, or windows
P O  being smashed.  Two were based on slogans chanted by
P O  the crowd (`We're Not Going Back' and `Queers Fight
P O  Back').  Two more were based on individual voices (one
P O  shouting `Go for it,' and several people yelling `Burn
P O  it' as the California state office building caught
P O  fire).

At times, the speaking voice was doubled by a viola or cello.
Sometimes the violins were playing screams, blending in with the tape.
At one point, all four players were blowing whistles:

P O  Much of the peculiar sound of this music comes from
P O  the whistles that many lesbians and gays carry as a
P O  basic self-defence tool, and which emerged from
P O  peoples' [sic] pockets by the hundreds during the
P O  riot.  (A recent survey estimates that over one
P O  million hate-motivated assaults against queer people
P O  take place in the U.S. each year.) The whistles used
P O  by the Kronos Quartet are provided by Community United
P O  Against Violence, a San Francisco-based organisation
P O  which assists victims of queer-bashings.

So there's this large audience in the Royal Festival Hall
reading this programme, and listening to Sara's words:

P S  The first time someone said queer and I knew they
P S  meant me.  I'm swinging a stick as I walk past the
P S  stoop, eating a popsicle, glancing up and the world
P S  breaks open with the single word exploding out of the
P S  sentence, my life sentence, the wrong thing I did
P S  somehow, the wrong thing I am, queer.
P S  
P S  The first time someone I know was killed for it.  Back
P S  before most of the men I know were dying, Vernon's
P S  down by the river one evening and a guy drives by with
P S  a semi-automatic rifle and opens fire, screaming
P S  "Faggots die." The first time someone really tries to
P S  kill me.  With a knife like they tried to kill Julio,
P S  a baseball bat like they did Jo, a bottle like Mickey,
P S  a two by four like Matt, a fist and a fist and a fist
P S  and a foot and a fist.
P S  
P S  The first time I watched a friend die.  Back when only
P S  some government doctors knew what was spreading and
P S  they kept quiet.  Phil lying by the window scared and
P S  surprised, and the priest says Victor can't come in
P S  because he's not family.  The first time I think this
P S  can't keep on happening, maybe I should die too.  Like
P S  Bruce in the hospital on his last birthday,
P S  thirty-one, in a wheelchair with a party hat and a
P S  useless IV drip.  Manuel mad, spitting blood in the
P S  kitchen, because he can't afford the drugs.  Jerry
P S  going blind and the insurance company cancels his
P S  policy.  Vince going blind and his folks refuse to
P S  talk to him.  Diane tossing in pain and no one will
P S  hold her hand.  Tim propped up in the waiting room,
P S  Raul starving at home, Gregory in the back seat of a
P S  car, racing, racing towards his death.
P S  
P S  The first time I say I love you to a man I haven't
P S  said it to before.  And I'm mad that it took this
P S  long, and I'm queer as hell, and I can feel my heart
P S  again, just like the first time, beating.  Beating and
P S  breaking and beaten and breaking and beaten and beaten
P S  and breaking and beating, beating, beating.

There were tears in my eyes as I listened.

P  The commissioning of _All the Rage_ was made possible
P  by a grant from Meet the Composer/Reader's Digest
P  Commissioning Program, in partnership with the
P  National Endowment for the Arts and the Lila
P  Wallace-Reader's Digest Fund.

[Whew,]
-- 
Roger Phillips                            roger@quantime.co.uk
"*lachrymator* a substance that causes tears to flow, as tear-gas: a
contrivance for letting it loose" -- Chambers English Dictionary (1988)