Dynamo:
scenes from the life of Thomas A. Edison
In January we mailed our CD to all Kickstarter donors who qualified to receive one. Here is a pdf of the lyrics. Open by clicking on the icon. You may then download.
​
The Song Cycle
Dynamo, a song cycle for tenor, soprano and six instrumentalists, was composed by Larry London. The libretto is by William Smock. With an overture and 16 songs it runs about 50 minutes. The theme of the work is a question: what kind of person does it take to transform the world? Thomas Edison is probably mankind's single greatest benefactor. Where would we be without electric lights, motion pictures and recorded sound? Dynamo, although it has a more or less lighthearted character, shows that Edison’s greatest weaknesses – an icy temperament, insane persistence in the face of insuperable odds, naive scientific understanding – were his greatest strengths as an inventor and entrepreneur. It shows how cold calculation and brilliant, public-spirited originality can dwell together, and the toll this takes on the great man's family and colleagues.
​
The songs are sprightly, but they have an ironic undertone. The melodies recall the parlor and music hall songs of the time, filtered through Stravinsky and Kurt Weill. They shine a light both on Edison’s achievements and on the wreckage he left in his wake. Two singers play many roles: Edison, his wives, co-workers and associates.
​
London and Smock originally imagined this story as a work of music theater. They turned out to have a very naive understanding of the economics and cultural dynamics of the opera world. London’s success with The Dynamo Quintet in Telluride in 2015 encouraged all parties to reimagine Dynamo as a chamber work for two singers. Reduced to its essentials, with a sophisticated orchestration for small ensemble, the work offers chamber music programmers a lively change of pace.
Breaking News
Our Kickstarter campaign hit its target. The work premiered at the Telluride Chamber Music Festival on August 19, 2016. We received a standing ovation. Two new songs were added after the Berkeley workshop, and in response to popular demand we added supertitles. See pictures and music video below.
​
We presented a free workshop performance in Berkeley on May 23 in the Crowden School auditorium. See pictures below.
​
​
The workshop performance went beautifully. Compliments from the audience applied equally to the music and words, the singers and the players. From pianist Robin Sutherland: "I think the whole affair met with that wonderful brand of approval that's kinda the reason we all stay in this crazy business." From composer Robert Hughes: "What an extraordinary piece - what an extraordinary evening! The crème de la crème onstage, la crème de la crème in the audience!" From Elinor Armer, who teaches composition at the San Francisco Conservatory: "Milhaud’s smiling face loomed overhead like a Cheshire Cat." (Darius Milhaud was one of Larry London's mentors.)
​
The audience was fairly unanimous in regretting that they couldn't understand every word. So we added projected supertitles to the Telluride performance. There was also some sentiment in favor of a longer program. We added two songs which vary the pace, strengthen the work dramatically, and move some of the biographical exposition from the spoken introduction to the work itself.
We are profoundly grateful to the Kickstarter donors who enabled us to lift this work off the paper and into the air.
​
​
Music Video
This 45-minute Youtube video documents the Telluride performance, enhanced by period photos and early Edison film footage. To see the lyrics as subtitles, click "cc" at the bottom right corner of the screen. To fill your screen, click the bracketed rectangle at lower right.
​
​
​
​
Personnel
Composer Larry London did his undergraduate work at Harvard and earned a Master's degree in composition at Mills College. He studied with Darius Milhaud, Terry Riley and Lou Harrison. He has played clarinet in all of the Bay Area's professional orchestras. He teaches music at Bay Area colleges and gives private lessons. His compositions have been performed at the Aspen and Cabrillo Music Festivals, by the Oakland Symphony and the San Francisco Symphony chamber series. He has contributed as a composer, arranger or performer to over fifty films. He composed the music for Isamu Noguchi: Stones and Paper, an American Masters documentary film recognized as Best Portrait at the Montreal International Festival of Films in 1998. His website is: http://larrylondon.wix.com/music
Librettist William Smock worked with London on the film Isamu Noguchi Stones and Paper, which he produced and edited. He has been executive producer for several PBS documentaries and has written and edited countless industrial films. He is also the author/illustrator of a book on design: The Bauhaus Ideal Then and Now. He sees in Edison’s personality the peculiar strengths and liabilities that characterize many highly successful people .
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
Soprano Eileen Morris has sung leading roles in Falstaff, Tales of Hoffmann, Don Giovanni, The Marriage of Figaro, The Elixir of Love, Cosi Fan Tutte, Gianni Schicchi, and The Consul. She originated the role of Isabel Peron in Carlos Franzetti’s Corpus Evita, and sang the role on his Grammy-nominated recording.
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
John Duykers has performed in opera houses and concert halls around the world, notably in works by John Adams, Philip Glass and other contemporary composers. He sang Mao Tse-tung in the world premiere of Nixon in China.
​
​
The Telluride Chamber Players:
Violinist Roy Malan, 40-year concertmaster for the San Francisco Ballet, is on the faculty at U.C Santa Cruz, where his Porter String Quartet is in residence, and directs the Telluride Chamber Music Festival. He was concertmaster of the California Chamber Orchestra for 20 years and is a member of the San Francisco Contemporary Chamber Players.
Violist Nancy Ellis has been a member of the SF Symphony since 1976. She is an active chamber musician with SF Symphony Chamber Music Sundaes, with the Jupiter Quartet, with the Cheltenham, Ojai and Marlboro Music Festivals, with the Chamber Soloists of San Francisco.
Violinist Susan Freier is a member of the Ives Quartet (formerly the Stanford String Quartet). She has been a participant at the Aspen, Grand Teton and Telluride Music Festivals. She joined the San Francisco Contemporary Chamber Players in 1993.
Cellist Stephen Harrison is a founding member of the Ives String Quartet and a member of the the Stanford University faculty since 1983. Former principal cellist of the Opera Company of Boston, the New England Chamber Orchestra and the Chamber Orchestra of San Francisco.
​
Clarinetist Carlos Julián Ortega recently completed his master's in clarinet performance at Florida's Lynn University, as a member of the studio of Jon Manasse.
Robin Sutherland holds the Jean and Bill Lane Principal Chair in Keyboards for the San Francisco Symphony. He has played with and for the greatest musicians of our time.
​
