Composer Steve Mackey's Memoir is a 75-minute work for narrator, string quartet and percussion duo based on the unpublished memoir written by his mother — Elaine Mackey. Ms. Mackey bore witness to the tumultuous 20th Century - The Great Depression, WWII, while battling social anxiety, divorce, and alcoholism. She writes with disarming candor about her experiences, which are brought to life in son Steve's propulsive, yet tender, heartfelt score. Director Mark DeChiazza writes that “The text of Elaine’s memoir, provide Mackey his point of entry—a portal through which he conducts a musical conversation with his mother, and his engagement with the document she left him." The recording features stunning performances by narrator Natalie Christa Rakes, who is joined by two of today's leading ensembles, the Dover Quartet and arx duo.
BRIDGE 9601
Reviews:
"Memoir foregrounds the multidimensional pleasures of a compelling narrative woven into a vibrant musical fabric. Mackey’s score is a narrative portrait of his mother, as she traverses universal social and psychological tribulations of the past century. Memoir affirms the genre-transcending fascination of both narrative and music thanks to Natalie Christa Rakes’s shining voice-acting and the unflagging beauty of sonorities from the arx duo and Dover Quartet." — Jeff Rosenfeld, San Francisco Classical Voice
"Both as narrator and actor, Natalie Christa Rakes sets a high standard for subsequent performances of Memoir with her uncanny ability to inhabit Elaine through all her improbable adventures from Pittsburgh to Hollywood, and yet still leave an intriguing amount to the imagination. The Dover Quartet take full advantage of Mackey’s idiomatic writing for strings, and the Arx Duo play with a wide range of sounds from simply percussive to astoundingly beautiful." — Gramophone
"Most interesting is how the musical relationship between the speaker and the instrumental ensemble shifts; the instruments do not have a simple accompanimental role but, at times, reflect the cadences of Rakes' speech. The effect is a bit difficult to describe, but some sampling is likely to draw listeners into a fascinating work." — AllMusic
