New Releasings
Labor Records in collaboration with Naxos is releasing a series of recordings of my work covering more than half a century! The most recent release is "Jukebox in the Tavern of Love" paired with a new work by Meredith Monk. "The Nude Paper Sermon" and "Wiretap" is a double album containing no fewer than five works; see below for details. "Civilization & its Discontents" is a words-and-music collaboration with Michael Sahl. More information, reviews and ordering (physical or digital editions) is available below or by going to Labor Records.
Review of Salzman’s Jukebox in the Tavern of Love
An extended review by Randy Woolf of the Eric Salzman and Valerie Vasilevski Jukebox in the Tavern of Love (commissioned and performed by the Western Wind Vocal Ensemble) is in the current issue of the New Music Connoisseur.
Date Posted // January 03, 2010
In Categories // Jukebox in the Tavern of Love, News, Reviews, Works and Productions
Report on the Bargemusic Performance
The performances of Jukebox in the Tavern of Love in July at Bargemusic were a big success. Both performances were sold out and were well noticed in the press and online. A CD and DVD of the Western Wind performance of this work will be available shortly. Jukebox was commissioned from librettist/director Valeria Vasilevski and Salzman as a companion piece to a 1605 madrigal comedy by Andriano Banchieri and the two works are performed together as a double bill.
Date Posted // August 02, 2009
In Categories // Jukebox in the Tavern of Love, News, Works and Productions
Western Wind Vocal Ensemble Performs Excerpts from Jukebox in the Tavern of Love
An excerpt from Jukebox in the Tavern of Love was performed by the Western Wind Vocal Ensemble on their O Beautiful American Music program (originally created for National Public Radio) in November at the New York Historical Society and they will perform another excerpt or two at their big anniversary celebration on May 16th. Jukebox is a “madrigal comedy” commissioned by the Western Wind on an original text by Valeria Vasilevski about six people trapped in a bar during a huge storm and blackout. The Western Wind has performed it, together with a madrigal comedy of 1607 by Adriano Banchieri about people on a ferryboat going from Venice to Padua, at the Tenri Center in Greenwich Village, and at The Flea in downtown NYC. They plan to bring it back next season in New York and on tour. There will also be a CD and DVD of the work to be released later this year.
Date Posted // February 18, 2009
In Categories // Events, Jukebox in the Tavern of Love, News, Works and Productions
Report on the CCO Colloquium and Salzman’s Radio Interview on WBAI
The Center for Contemporary Opera held a public panel or colloquium event on the subject of The New Music Theater in December at The Cell Theater in Manhattan with Eric Salzman, Thomas Desi and several distinguished colleagues—Rinde Eckert, Steven Osgood, Diane Wondisford and Grethe Barrett Holby. Salzman visited Vienna in mid-January and a similar panel was held at the Kunstlerhaus (Artist House) there with Thomas, the Italian composer Maurizio Squillante and Laura Berman of the artistic staff of the Bregenz Festival. Salzman also did a program on his own music theater work—with special emphasis on The Nude Paper Sermon, The True Last Words of Dutch Schultz, and Jukebox in the Tavern of Love—at the University two days later.
Also in December, the program Through the Opera Glass, hosted by Marc Laiosa on WBAI-FM, held an extended, three-hour interview with Salzman about his life and work, complete with generous musical excerpts (Salzman spent a couple of crucial periods of his life as music director of WBAI where he founded the legendary Free Music Store).
Date Posted // January 10, 2009
In Categories // Jukebox in the Tavern of Love, News, Radio, The Nude Paper Sermon, The True Last Words of Dutch Schultz, Works and Productions
Staged Premiere of Salzman’s Jukebox in the Tavern of Love at The Flea Theater
Jukebox in the Tavern of Love, a modern madrigal comedy by Valeria Vasilevski and Eric Salzman, had its staged premiere from May 29 to June 1, 2008, at The Flea, an off-off-Broadway theater on White Street in New York’s Tribeca district. The work was paired with a ‘real’ 1605 madrigal comedy by Adriano Banchieri, “La Barca di Venetia per Padova” or “The Ferryboat from Venice to Padova”. The double bill was performed by the Western Wind which commissioned “Jukebox” and both pieces were directed by Ms Vasilevski. An audio CD and a DVD of the work will be available this fall; details to be announced.
In the meanwhile, two of the numbers, The Dancer’s Story (“Brush, chug, shuffle”) and the Utility Worker’s Song (“All that is left of me,” after Rumi) have been recorded for Public Radio International for a 4th of July American music program by the Western Wind that also includes music by Meredith Monk and William Bolcom.
Date Posted // June 02, 2008
In Categories // Jukebox in the Tavern of Love, News, Works and Productions