Project Title:
Utopian Blues
Project Description:
My project will be of audio nature. It will be a musical piece dealing with the idea of utopian blues by Hakim Bey. I will incorporate some of his readings in the sound piece, and I will compose music to go along with his reading. His readings will be the foreground, where as the music will be the background. Since the idea of Utopia is an ideal place, I shall try to incorporate that ideal and imaginary idea into the project.
Project theory:
u·to·pi·a Pronunciation Key (y-tp-)
n.
often Utopia An ideally perfect place, especially in its social, political,
and moral aspects.
A work of fiction describing a utopia.
An impractical, idealistic scheme for social and political reform.
Utopia is a unity, not a uniformity -- and it contains antinomies. Utopian
desire never comes to an end, even -- or especially! -- in utopia. And music
will always be the last veil (of 70,000 veils of light and darkness) that
separates us from the "order of intimacy". Music will never lose
its holy unholiness; it will always contain the trace of the violence of sacrifice.
How then could the "blues" ever come to an end -- that orgone indigo
utopian melancholy caress of sound, that little-bit-too-much, that difference?
The low caste of the musician will of course be dissolved in utopia -- but
somehow a certain untouchability will linger, a certain dandyism, a pride.
The one tragedy that this Harmonian Blues will never lament is the loss of
the blues of itself, its appropriation, its alienation, its betrayal, its
demonic possession. This is the "utopian minimum", the money-back
guarantee, the sine qua non -- the music is ours.
Audience Perception:
Basically, I want my audience to feel the purity and ideality of the music. I also want them to feel the intensity and purity of Hakim Bey's reading. Moreover I want them to feel the relatedness of the music and words.
Progress: