San Francisco composer Erling Wold would be characterized as part of the "American Maverick" tradition, creating an individualistic style that doesn't come across quite like anything else. His music is most closely related to minimalism, and his vocal writing sometimes calls John Adams to mind, but he takes it in such skewed, eccentric directions, driven by a wildly independent and surreal vision, that it couldn't be mistaken for anyone else's. An acoustic engineer by day and a composer by night, Wold has nonetheless had a ...
Read More
San Francisco composer Erling Wold would be characterized as part of the "American Maverick" tradition, creating an individualistic style that doesn't come across quite like anything else. His music is most closely related to minimalism, and his vocal writing sometimes calls John Adams to mind, but he takes it in such skewed, eccentric directions, driven by a wildly independent and surreal vision, that it couldn't be mistaken for anyone else's. An acoustic engineer by day and a composer by night, Wold has nonetheless had a remarkably productive career, most notable for his chamber operas, A Little Girl Dreams of Taking the Veil, based on Max Ernst; Queer, based on William Borroughs; and Sub Pontio Pilato. Tenor John Duykers, who starred in the last work, asked Wold for a solo opera, and the result, with a libretto by Douglas Kearney, is Mordake. It's based on the life of Englishman Edvard Mordake, first mentioned in medical histories in the 19th century, who was born with a face, a "parasitic twin," on...
Read Less
