Meredith Monk Retrospective on Cantaloupe

Meredith Monk (photograph by John Edward Mason, courtesy of Jensen Artists)

Three of the founders of the Cantaloupe Music record label in 2001, Michael Gordon, David Lang, and Julia Wolfe, were also founders of Bang on a Can in 1987. Thus, while the label now has an extensive repertoire of performers, it has also served as the “house label” for Bang on a Can. This past Friday, the label released MEMORY GAME, a retrospective of the music of Meredith Monk bringing together Meredith Monk & Vocal Ensemble with the Bang on a Can All-Stars. Gordon, Lang, and Wolfe all contributed arrangements of Monk originals. The selections on the album cover works composed by Monk between 1983 and 2006.

Unless I am mistaken, I had my first encountered with Monk in the summer of 1971 at the American Dance Festival, held at Connecticut College in New London. We all sat on the grass to listen to her give a recital of her songs, accompanying herself on a small electronic keyboard. The audio conditions were not ideal, but this was my first exposure to texts that deliberately explored the ambiguity between phonemes and the words that emerge when phonemes are juxtaposed. The music itself was minimal, working with a paucity of motifs and accompanying riffs. The delivery was dead serious, and most of us on audience side responded with respectful concentration.

However, much of Monk’s work had theatrical elements. In a major partnership with Ping Chong, she composed the music for the “science fiction opera” The Games. Unless I am mistaken, I saw at least excerpts from this work in performance when I was working in Connecticut and taking the train into Manhattan to attend performances almost every night. As I recall, the performance I saw involved the intense education of some alien (as in outer space) culture to prepare them to assimilate with the population of planet Earth. (This included teaching the aliens about dogs, and a dog sat obediently on a surgical table as its properties were described.)

Five of the tracks on MEMORY GAME are taken from The Games. However, only “Memory Game” resonated in recall, not because of what I had seen in New York but because it was included on Monk’s ECM album Do You Be. In fact all of MEMORY GAME seems to involve music that had been performed in some form of theatrical setting. Nevertheless, there is enough diversity in the tracks to engage the attentive listener even without any dramatic context. The instrumental arrangements for the Bang on a Can All-Stars offer a wider gamut of sonorities than one encounters in Monk’s performances with her own group, but that diversity does not detract from the composer’s unique approach to vocalization.

That said, it is worth noting that Monk’s music is very much an acquired taste. Due to the rich context of music I was experiencing during the last 30 years of the last century, I have almost always approached Monk’s music with a positive attitude. On the other hand I know many that are annoyed, rather than intrigued. Those without past experience of her work might do well to read the background text she has provided for the booklet that accompanies MEMORY GAME. It is likely to provide some useful “signposts” to guide the attentive ear through the journey plotted out in this new album.