Excerpts from Workshop Performance, December 10, 2010 WNYC Greene Space - NYC, NY
"We have seen Lucy use the following tools"
"Lucy's Vocab at Age 9.5"
"Completely at home"
Our Basic Nature featured on Minnesota Public Radio
On November 15, 2010, the team from Our Basic Nature participated in Nautilus Music Theater's "Rough Cuts" series, giving audiences in St. Paul, Minnesota a glimpse of the unfinished opera. Minnesota Public Radio got intereseted in the story and produced a fantastic feature on the opera for their All Things Considered radio show. You can read the story here, and listen to the piece that played on MPR below.
Excerpts from the Libretto
Hear Andrew Wilkowske read excerpts from the libretto for Our Basic Nature. Recorded at a Public Reading/Workshop in Roseboom, NY on August 9, 2010.
Excerpt 1
Baby chimpanzees are far more intriguing than human infants Baby chimpanzees are far more intriguing than human infants. I never had to wait long to see my beautiful daughter do something clever and wonderful, something that filled me with delight. Looking into her clear brown eyes as she sits in my lap, her arms entwined about me, I have the feeling that the deeper I look into Lucy the more I see of my own basic nature.
Most clearly (1) The emotions [Lucy] exhibits most clearly are affection, anger, fear, joy, tenderness, greed, jealousy, anxiety, concern, protectiveness.
Baby's first year She smiled and laughed from the first day. At two months, her eyes would focus and follow a bright object. At three months she could walk about on all fours. At five months she was trying to climb out of her crib. At six months she was pretty mobile on all four limbs, and had a concept of play and a “play face.” At eight months she would walk alone, but never very far from Jane or me.
Excerpt 2
Lucy looked me directly in the eye I was appalled to see Lucy sitting in the center of the floor surrounded by the remains of the banana tree. She had torn every leaf off it, had taken bites out of leaves, and had even emptied the soil onto the floor. Guests were due any minute. I lost control, I screamed, and raised my hand to strike her, cursing with all the strength I could command. Lucy looked me directly in the eye, smiled her little girl smile, and touched her nose with her thumb, forefinger extended in the ASL sign which means, “I’m Lucy.” I stopped in mid-gesture. I could not hit her, my eloquent chimpanzee daughter.
Most clearly (3) The emotions [Lucy] exhibits most clearly are affection, anger, fear, joy, tenderness, greed, jealousy, anxiety, concern, protectiveness.
The power to ask questions Before ASL it was clear that Lucy had a primitive sense of beauty and aesthetics—she would draw, use finger paints and crayons, and work at her production until she got it just right. And I have seen her sit and stare as though enraptured at a beautiful sunset. Since she acquired her ASL signs she does the same things, but now she asks “What’s that?” Interestingly, she has never asked, “Why?"
Other Samples
Hear other works by John Glover, including selections from a song cycle written for Andrew Wilkowske and Jocelyn Dueck.
Solaristics, for orchestra (performed by USC Symphony; Donald Crockett, conductor)
Man, age 58 from I am Other: songs for baritone, violin, and piano (performed by Andrew Wilkowske, Leona Nadj, Jocelyn Dueck; text by Luisa Villani)
Boy, age 7 from I am Other: songs for baritone, violin, and piano (performed by Andrew Wilkowske, Leona Nadj, Jocelyn Dueck; text by Luisa Villani)
