Three Voices

Morton Feldman conceived Three Voices to be performed by three identical soprano voices: a live singer performs one voice while the other two are played back on tape over loudspeakers placed on either side of her. According to author Paul van Emmerick, the loudspeakers are meant to represent the tombstones of painter Philip Guston and poet Frank O’ Hara. “The composition is thus a metaphor for a conversation of a ‘living voice with the voices of the dead’, and is thereby not just a memorial to Guston and O’Hara, but also a dirge for the generation of artists to which Feldman belonged.”
Three Voices is being presented in conjunction with Medicine Show’s theatrical production of The Republic Of Poetry.