Scripts
Librettos for Operas and Other Musical Works
- Publisher
- Coach House Books
- Initial publish date
- Oct 2004
- Category
- Opera, Individual Composer & Musician, Canadian
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9781552451496
- Publish Date
- Oct 2004
- List Price
- $24.95
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Description
The late James Reaney remains one of Canada's favourite poets and playwrights; at the intersection of his dramatic and poetic talents is Scripts, a collection of musical writings. There are nine complete works here, including the chamber opera Night-blooming Cereus, the poetry/music collage (and Governor General's Award winner) Twelve Letters to a Small Town, the Canada Dot, Canada Dash trilogy and operas Shivaree , Taptoo! and Serinette. Many of these pieces have been published individually, but none are in print, and they have never been amassed.
About the authors
James Reaney was born on a farm in South Easthope near Stratford, Ontario in 1926. He has won the Governor General's Award three times for his poetry, though he is perhaps better-known as a playwright, especially for his landmark Donnelly trilogy (1974-75). Reaney's theatrical adaptation of Lewis Carroll's Alice Through the Looking-Glass returned to the stage at Stratford in the summer of 1996.
His work includes: The Red Heart, poems, 1949; A Suit of Nettles, poems, 1958; Twelve Letters to a Small Town, poems, 1962; The Killdeer & Other Plays, drama, 1962; Colours in the Dark, drama, 1969; Collected Poems, 1972; Listen to the Wind, drama, 1972; The Donnellys, a trilogy of plays, 1974-75; Baldoon (with C.H. Gervais), 1976; The Boy With an R in His Hand, young adult, 1980; Take the Big Picture, young adult, 1986; Alice Through the Looking-Glass, stage adaptation, 1994. James Reaney died in 2008.
John Beckwith’s thirty-eight years with the Faculty of Music, University of Toronto, included seven as its dean and five as founding director of its Institute for Canadian Music. Among his compositions are four operas and many orchestral, choral, chamber, and solo works. A frequent contributor to Canadian and foreign music journals, he is the author of Music Papers (1997) and In Search of Alberto Guerrero (WLU Press, 2006).
Since 1972 Brian Cherney has been on the staff of the Faculty of Music (now the Schulich School of Music) at McGill University, where he teaches composition at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. His extensive compositional output includes orchestral, choral, and instrumental music. His monograph on the Canadian composer Harry Somers was published in 1975.
Other titles by
Alice Through the Looking Glass
The Voyageur Modern Canadian Literature 5-Book Bundle
The Silence on the Shore / Combat Journal for Place d'Armes / The Donnellys / In This Poem I Am / Canadian Exploration Literature
Colours in the Dark
A Suit of Nettles
The Essential James Reaney
Reaney Days in the West Room
The Donnellys
Souwesto Home
The Box Social & Other Stories
Take the Big Picture
Other titles by
In Search of Alberto Guerrero
Mapping Canada's Music
Selected Writings of Helmut Kallmann
Unheard Of
Memoirs of a Canadian Composer
Weinzweig
Essays on His Life and Music
John Beckwith
Music Papers: Articles and Talks By a Canadian Composer 1964-1994
Musical Canada
Words and Music Honouring Helmut Kallmann
