Press

Press Articles:

» American Opera
Dan Fox in Frieze #145, March 2012
 
» Robert Ashley by Alex Waterman
BOMB Magazine, Winter, 2011/12
 
»Why Has Bodhidharma Left For the South?: Vidas Perfectas
Augusta Palmer in doobeedoobeedoo, January 28, 2012
 
»In Conversation: Alex Waterman
Timothy Nassau in The Brooklyn Rail, December-January, 2011/12
 
» Critic's Pick: Vidas Perfectas
Steve Smith in The New York Times, December 15, 2011
 
» Robert Ashley Gets a New Backdrop
Catherine Kron in Art In America, December 12, 2011
 
» Critic's Pick: Vidas Perfectas
Time Out New York, December 8, 2011
 
» Vidas Perfectas: Interview with Ned Sublette & Elio Villafranca
David Weinstein on Art International Radio, November 28, 2011
 
» Interview: Robert Ashley
Duncan Cooper in The Fader, November 17, 2011
 
» Robert Ashley: A visionary opera composer inspires a new generation of followers
Amanda MacBlane in Time Out New York, October 21, 2011
 
» Composer (and Others) Rethinking His Works
Steve Smith in the New York Times, September 16, 2011
 
» DRAM celebrates the visionary composer, writer, and experimentalist Robert Ashley
 
 
 
 

Press Contact:

Eve Essex

eve@vidasperfectas.org

 

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Press Releases:

MARCH 2012

​VIDAS PERFECTAS at

Le poisson rouge

 

 

SEPTEMBER 2011
Announcing Vidas Perfectas 
(ENGLISH PDF)

 

Anunciando Vidas Perfectas
(SPANISH PDF)

Upcoming:

Vidas Perfectas: three episodes

September 28, 2012

@ Serpentine Gallery Pavilion, London

 

Vidas Perfectas: two episodes

September 29, 2012

@ Café Oto, London

 

Robert Ashley: talk and performance

September 30, 2012

@ Café Oto, London

 

"Waterman and his collaborators delicately transform Ashley’s music; it remains unmistakably Ashley, but Latin influences are teased out and foregrounded, by both Villafranca’s piano and by new shifts of rhythmic emphasis in the pre-recorded drum patterns. The performances in Spanish put Ashley’s libretto into motion in new ways."

 

—Frieze (Dan Fox)

“NOTHING LESS THAN THE FIRST AMERICAN OPERA, WRITTEN WITHIN AN AMERICAN LANGUAGE UTILIZING VARIOUS AMERICAN ATTENTION SPANS: SNIPPETS FOR THE CHANNEL SWITCHERS, LAYERS OF MEANING FOR THE SMART-ALECKS, SOMETHING FOR EVERYONE, AND ACCESSIBLE. WORKS SUCH AS THIS PUT TO REST ANY DOUBTS IF OPERA CAN OR SHOULD SURVIVE, AND HOW."

 

—FANFARE (ALLAN EVANS)

"Ashley brings us a totally new form of opera that makes sung speech sound like talk, synthetic orchestration sound like unconscious thought, and the performance feel like dream that we can't wake from. Ashley didn't just reinvent opera he has reimagined the American musical landscape."

 

—Alex Waterman

"Vidas Perfectas juxtaposes characters as all-American as the captain of the football team and the homecoming queen with a shout out to Giordano Bruno, the monk, mystic and mnemonist ... But, above all what struck me was that the collision of these elements resulted in something far more affecting than the sum of its parts."

 

—Augusta Palmer

"Robert Ashley is not only an opera composer, but the greatest opera composer of the last half-century, and the most innovative opera composer since... Monteverdi. No one else has applied to opera the kinds of structure Ashley has invented. He has blazed a completely independent path. Robert Ashley is the postmodern opera composer. There is really no one else.

 

—Kyle Gann

"Robert Ashley changed the game completely. There is no other composer living today that has been able to create an entirely new kind of opera. Others have innovated, played with, polished up, improved upon or just added to the form as it has existed for the last few hundred years. "

 

—Alex Waterman

"Waterman has built Vidas Perfectas along the same lines as Ashley’s productions of Perfect Lives: with Gordon back on board as producer, and artist Sarah Crowner designing the sets, Vidas Perfectas ‘uses the social relations that were involved in making the music as the model for its remaking’, embracing conversation, improvisation and process to tint and colour the production in new ways."

 

—Frieze (Dan Fox)

"WHAT ABOUT THE BIBLE? AND THE KORAN? IT DOESN'T MATTER. WE HAVE PERFECT LIVES"

 

—JOHN CAGE

"In the Vidas Perfectas lounge, Spanish and English are mutually understood. They trade both languages as common currency. In Vidas Perfectas, the Americas are sewn back together through the beauty of heightened speech and song. It is still very much a comic opera about reincarnation. This time through we hope to rebirth a part of the American spirit in the process."

 

—Alex Waterman

“Separated from the humming drone of his music—his lyrics serve as odd masterpieces of American vernacular, recalling the loose tongue of Bukowski, the neurosis of Spalding Gray, and the abstract lyricism of Ghostface Killah.”

 

—The Village Voice

(Ross Simonini)

"Waterman and his collaborators delicately transform Ashley’s music; it remains unmistakably Ashley, but Latin influences are teased out and foregrounded, by both Villafranca’s piano and by new shifts of rhythmic emphasis in the pre-recorded drum patterns. The performances in Spanish put Ashley’s libretto into motion in new ways."

 

—Frieze (Dan Fox)

“NOTHING LESS THAN THE FIRST AMERICAN OPERA, WRITTEN WITHIN AN AMERICAN LANGUAGE UTILIZING VARIOUS AMERICAN ATTENTION SPANS: SNIPPETS FOR THE CHANNEL SWITCHERS, LAYERS OF MEANING FOR THE SMART-ALECKS, SOMETHING FOR EVERYONE, AND ACCESSIBLE. WORKS SUCH AS THIS PUT TO REST ANY DOUBTS IF OPERA CAN OR SHOULD SURVIVE, AND HOW."

 

—FANFARE (ALLAN EVANS)

"Ashley brings us a totally new form of opera that makes sung speech sound like talk, synthetic orchestration sound like unconscious thought, and the performance feel like dream that we can't wake from. Ashley didn't just reinvent opera he has reimagined the American musical landscape."

 

—Alex Waterman

"Vidas Perfectas juxtaposes characters as all-American as the captain of the football team and the homecoming queen with a shout out to Giordano Bruno, the monk, mystic and mnemonist ... But, above all what struck me was that the collision of these elements resulted in something far more affecting than the sum of its parts."

 

—Augusta Palmer

"Robert Ashley is not only an opera composer, but the greatest opera composer of the last half-century, and the most innovative opera composer since... Monteverdi. No one else has applied to opera the kinds of structure Ashley has invented. He has blazed a completely independent path. Robert Ashley is the postmodern opera composer. There is really no one else.

 

—Kyle Gann

"Robert Ashley changed the game completely. There is no other composer living today that has been able to create an entirely new kind of opera. Others have innovated, played with, polished up, improved upon or just added to the form as it has existed for the last few hundred years. "

 

—Alex Waterman

"Waterman has built Vidas Perfectas along the same lines as Ashley’s productions of Perfect Lives: with Gordon back on board as producer, and artist Sarah Crowner designing the sets, Vidas Perfectas ‘uses the social relations that were involved in making the music as the model for its remaking’, embracing conversation, improvisation and process to tint and colour the production in new ways."

 

—Frieze (Dan Fox)

"WHAT ABOUT THE BIBLE? AND THE KORAN? IT DOESN'T MATTER. WE HAVE PERFECT LIVES"

 

—JOHN CAGE

"In the Vidas Perfectas lounge, Spanish and English are mutually understood. They trade both languages as common currency. In Vidas Perfectas, the Americas are sewn back together through the beauty of heightened speech and song. It is still very much a comic opera about reincarnation. This time through we hope to rebirth a part of the American spirit in the process."

 

—Alex Waterman

“Separated from the humming drone of his music—his lyrics serve as odd masterpieces of American vernacular, recalling the loose tongue of Bukowski, the neurosis of Spalding Gray, and the abstract lyricism of Ghostface Killah.”

 

—The Village Voice

(Ross Simonini)

© Vidas Perfectas 2012  |  info@vidasperfectas.org