w7804
| Title | Unicorn: A Music Theatre Piece |
| Contributors |
Buxton Orr (composer) Sappho (author) Rainer Maria Rilke (author) and others (author) |
| Composition date | 1981 1981 |
| Duration (mins) | 55 |
| Category | theatre electroacoustic |
| Instrumentation | S Bar Satb 2 Dancers Mimer / 1110 1110 Gu 3 Perc Vn Vc Va Tape |
| Commissioned by | Guildhall School of Music |
| Key signature | |
| First line | |
| First performed | 09 07 1981 Guildhall Music-Theatre Group Guildhall School of Music |
| Notes | |
| Programme Note | 'La Vue' is one of the six tapestries known as 'La Dame a la Licorne' and it serves as the focal point and prime inspiration for the present work. A selection of texts relevant to the legend of the Unicorn has been assembled: fragments from Sappho, various poems of the thirteenth to the seventeenth centuries in Latin, Mediaeval French and English, and finally the Sonnet written by Rilke on seeing this very tapestry in the Musee de Cluny in Paris. As Prologue, the audience is addressed in the words of an anonymous fourteenth-century Adult Lullaby, reminding them of their plight in common with 'all, that is of Adam's blode.' There follows a description of the distant fertile land where the Unicorn was born and of the birth itself. The women are charmed by the gentle creature and celebrate it with traditional mediaeval pageantry. As it grows into adulthood they sing of the magical powers contained in its horn and taunt the menfolk into a hunt. This is at first playful but it develops in earnest as the Unicorn becomes increasingly menacing. Finally the horn reveals itself in all its phallic aggression: the Unicorn sings 'Ich it am ... champion to heal all mankind in fight and all my raiment is bespray'd with their blood.' But, legend has it, the Unicorn will surrender to the caress of a pure Virgin. Gradually a tableau recalling the Cluny tapestry is formed. In Rilke's words, this creature 'that never was', this creation of love and of the imagination is seen as an object of contemplation, a symbol of the work of art. As the tableau fades, the Adult Lullaby is heard again as echo and as epilogue. Love has been made, not War. |
This work is associated with the following collection items:
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