I was finally happy, in other words. I wrote the book because at that moment my computer had broken, and without a means to fix it the only aspect of it which still functioned was its text-edit program. And so a book. It goes on at length on these subjects, actually; and I'll rationalize my promotion of it here by pointing out that the book is offered free, and will probably never be read otherwise in my lifetime.
The link is here (on dropbox): https://www.dropbox.com/s/t5pw6mwv6igov86/John%20Moran.pdf
How would you explain the relevance - or otherwise - of dramaturgy within your work?
John Moran: This questions pulls me back to the moment I experienced an abrupt shift in both subject matter and my approach to theater in general; namely, the moment in 2004 when I decided to create works which were autobiographical in nature. There came a point - after a 20 year career as a composer / theater-artist in New York - when fact became more interesting than fiction, and I felt the story as it was unfolding the most relevant observation I could offer regarding our world.
The link is here (on dropbox): https://www.dropbox.com/s/t5pw6mwv6igov86/John%20Moran.pdf
How would you explain the relevance - or otherwise - of dramaturgy within your work?
John Moran: This questions pulls me back to the moment I experienced an abrupt shift in both subject matter and my approach to theater in general; namely, the moment in 2004 when I decided to create works which were autobiographical in nature. There came a point - after a 20 year career as a composer / theater-artist in New York - when fact became more interesting than fiction, and I felt the story as it was unfolding the most relevant observation I could offer regarding our world.
People have asked me sometimes, if I 'make up' stories, but I never would. Why would one conclude a delicious meal such as life, with the bitter taste of castor oil; such is the effect of fantasy on the tongue, I've found.
The first work of pure autobiography, I think then would be John Moran..and his neighbor, Saori - which featured Japanese performer Saori Tsukada and myself (and which was the vehicle for my first meeting The Arches in Glasgow some years ago, thankfully) - and which is both factual and theatrical; this blending I aspire to now.
The first work of pure autobiography, I think then would be John Moran..and his neighbor, Saori - which featured Japanese performer Saori Tsukada and myself (and which was the vehicle for my first meeting The Arches in Glasgow some years ago, thankfully) - and which is both factual and theatrical; this blending I aspire to now.
Before that time, I'd created many large-scale theatrical works in New York, as a young art-star and living with Philip Glass - works fantastical in nature and often relying on stage-craft illusions - which had received a great deal of attention, but have since (materially) disappeared. This was a devastating experience for me at the time; 20 years of work being actively erased from public consciousness (despite having featured well known celebrities such as Iggy Pop, Uma Thurman or Allen Ginsberg, and my having first been mantled with absurd titles such as the 'wunderkind', and 'a modern-day Mozart') at the hands of politicized money interests in America - like Harvard University and Brooklyn Academy of Music - in order to cover up the financial misdeeds of said institutions which I became public bulldog to uncovering; they didn't find it 'appropriate', and in essence, a blacklisting of my work was to follow.
And has held. And eventuated in my being homeless for a period - living on the street in the city I had once thought of as my love; powers that be then purposely cold and unreasonable. These are the qualities of money, after all, and so I shouldn't have been surprised except naive. And so I turned my back on that currency, despite the praise beginning to return eventually. I didn't want it any more. I'll leave the rest to the elaborations of the link I began with, I think.
This politicized 'disappearance' of my work in America, though, and the period of homelessness which followed had a profound effect on me as an artist; I came to not only detest the notion of money (and it's BFF hypocrisy), but of large-scale productions. I've come to feel that where production values enter, honesty is asked to vacate in order to give the hands of polity more room to puppeteer.
But politics are famously ham-handed, aren't they? So no thank you. My question became, what value are tears if wrenched over force fed illusions? This month I'm living across the street from Kantor's childhood home, in what was the Jewish ghetto of Krakow. The holocaust was real. The military takeover of the government in Thailand last year, and its citizens losing their right to free-speech was real. My financial destitution and homelessness are real. The permanence of status in small ponds, is not.
So in response, I devoted myself to creating works which - apart from autobiographical - strive for an absolute simplicity of presentation; no costume, no beauty. Complex compositional ideas and deep ruminations on life, some say. But presented bare to encourage examination. No more deceptions.
Having little or nothing to do with the notion of Disney going forward, this became a principle I've adhered to, as it inadvertently opened a door to more compositional ideas than I care to mention at this moment.
It always begged a different definition, my work, because it combined a number of elements in ways which one hadn't seen before. Its words on the page didn't read like a play, as their stage-notes were so voluminous. One was told it was a musical composition, but there were no singers, or musicians.
What do you feel the role of the audience is, in terms of making the meaning of your work?
Reaching an audience is the purpose of theater; period. Without audience I would be forever content as ghost. Audiences matter more than safety. More than success. It makes no difference be it five or 5,000 individuals; to feel otherwise would be hypocrisy for artist. And if you approach an audience with that attitude, you'll find you will win them over. If reader is not inclined to agree with me, though, they may find Paris or Berlin appealing, where there are no shortage of performers who feel that privately investigating themselves, for themselves without skill-set in front of others, to have great value, from what I've observed.
And has held. And eventuated in my being homeless for a period - living on the street in the city I had once thought of as my love; powers that be then purposely cold and unreasonable. These are the qualities of money, after all, and so I shouldn't have been surprised except naive. And so I turned my back on that currency, despite the praise beginning to return eventually. I didn't want it any more. I'll leave the rest to the elaborations of the link I began with, I think.
This politicized 'disappearance' of my work in America, though, and the period of homelessness which followed had a profound effect on me as an artist; I came to not only detest the notion of money (and it's BFF hypocrisy), but of large-scale productions. I've come to feel that where production values enter, honesty is asked to vacate in order to give the hands of polity more room to puppeteer.
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| first cd I ever bought |
So in response, I devoted myself to creating works which - apart from autobiographical - strive for an absolute simplicity of presentation; no costume, no beauty. Complex compositional ideas and deep ruminations on life, some say. But presented bare to encourage examination. No more deceptions.
The work I'll come to Stereo with this month - Etude: Amsterdam - requires myself, an iPod and small box. And for an artist to need more I consider a weakness. My post-apocalyptic decade of statelessness now - a state of never-ending international tour, to be specific; changing continents on a monthly basis, no safety of home to return to anywhere - have forged an artist who is 'road tough'. Survival. What I have done, in that sense, is trade grand illusion for slight-of-hand in close up; you encounter me helpless at roadside, and stopping to gawk are beguiled into the numbness of superiority; a penniless loser got stoned and crashed his life here, you'll say.
And there I can see to stripping you. The message? That the currency of 'success' and 'status' are cheap. That your preconceptions are cheap. That safety reduces ones integrity to the level of greasy coin, covered in dirt and bacteria in a parade of grabbing hands. All of the corruption of things which one once valued dearly in themselves, can be averted by simply embracing failure. Embracing anonymity. Corruption relies on your fear of being outsider.
This, to me, is what I think you're defining as 'dramaturgy'. The craft of intention. Maybe you'll disagree.
What particular traditions and influences would you acknowledge on your work - have any particular artists, or genres inspired you and do you see yourself within their tradition?
When I was a child, growing up in Nebraska (the farm-land center of America) - having never gone to school and later living with members of a Jungian doomsday cult - I desperately wanted to be a Disney animator, as well as a creator of rides (see Disneyland). Instead of school then, I devoted myself to these studies. I was in a type of communication of sorts - by post - with staff at that theme-park, and it's department of 'imagineers', as they were called. They were very encouraging, and in this way I felt myself to be anointed somehow; one of the advantages of a childhood before the internet - all the world as private as parent.
My education having been the lengthy descriptions of early animation, it was painfully obvious that I wasn't capable of producing the googolplex of drawings required to replicate what I had learned to do there. And so, in that absence, I asked humans to fill that role, with their bodies. I long knew that recorded voices came first, whereupon the sound-wave would be transferred to the edge of a film-strip, in visual form; and from there be marked up as to where vowels landed in terms of frame number.
This, to me, is what I think you're defining as 'dramaturgy'. The craft of intention. Maybe you'll disagree.
What particular traditions and influences would you acknowledge on your work - have any particular artists, or genres inspired you and do you see yourself within their tradition?
When I was a child, growing up in Nebraska (the farm-land center of America) - having never gone to school and later living with members of a Jungian doomsday cult - I desperately wanted to be a Disney animator, as well as a creator of rides (see Disneyland). Instead of school then, I devoted myself to these studies. I was in a type of communication of sorts - by post - with staff at that theme-park, and it's department of 'imagineers', as they were called. They were very encouraging, and in this way I felt myself to be anointed somehow; one of the advantages of a childhood before the internet - all the world as private as parent.
My education having been the lengthy descriptions of early animation, it was painfully obvious that I wasn't capable of producing the googolplex of drawings required to replicate what I had learned to do there. And so, in that absence, I asked humans to fill that role, with their bodies. I long knew that recorded voices came first, whereupon the sound-wave would be transferred to the edge of a film-strip, in visual form; and from there be marked up as to where vowels landed in terms of frame number.
And how immediate it seemed to ask real people to assume the role of drawings, while observing the same principles. Having no image to correspond then to soundtracks I'd created from recorded voices and sound effects - and desiring to see one - I simply wrote it all down in detailed stage directions, and asked that actors fill the role of those drawings on stage, and in detailed synch.
Having little or nothing to do with the notion of Disney going forward, this became a principle I've adhered to, as it inadvertently opened a door to more compositional ideas than I care to mention at this moment.
It always begged a different definition, my work, because it combined a number of elements in ways which one hadn't seen before. Its words on the page didn't read like a play, as their stage-notes were so voluminous. One was told it was a musical composition, but there were no singers, or musicians.
It called for performers to lip synch, but that was misleading, as it also encompassed ankle synch, and neck synch. Stand up exactly here synch, and that's a wooden chair (which is audible but invisible) so I want to see its resistance show in your arm as you attempt to slide it on carpet, which is its timbre. And then - wait wait wait - your line! And waaaaaaait...NOW you start section B!' These would be phrases typical of rehearsal, if you threw in a few 'why don't you love me?'s, for flavor.
Later on and thereafter I was known as 'the protege of Philip Glass', having been somewhat adopted and (very much) supported by Glass at a young age, but in honesty I was far more influenced by the early works of Steve Reich, who today I can say I feel was superior composer.
Later on and thereafter I was known as 'the protege of Philip Glass', having been somewhat adopted and (very much) supported by Glass at a young age, but in honesty I was far more influenced by the early works of Steve Reich, who today I can say I feel was superior composer.
Whereas I've come to think of Glass in his later years as the Rupert Murdoch of composers; which I don't admire. Allen Ginsberg had a deep effect on my life, personally, although I never felt a kinship with his actual work. I didn't need to.
What I do hear most often from audiences, is that they've never seen work like mine, and I'll admit I haven't either - this echoes my theme in life as outsider, I don't even know who my parents were; and this is no tame construct. For me it has meant of life of always being reminded that there is no place for me. Apart from the adventure of mythos, I am told my rewards are reserved for a time when I am no longer here to receive them.
What I do hear most often from audiences, is that they've never seen work like mine, and I'll admit I haven't either - this echoes my theme in life as outsider, I don't even know who my parents were; and this is no tame construct. For me it has meant of life of always being reminded that there is no place for me. Apart from the adventure of mythos, I am told my rewards are reserved for a time when I am no longer here to receive them.
This realization is brought about in me upon questions of 'influence'. I am alone. And I'm grateful for that as in adventure I receive the best of the bargain, I believe. As truly, who among us can forgive themselves, inside, for having become complacent or off-track. I am not allowed that avenue.
Do you have a particular process of making that you could describe - where it begins, how you develop it, and whether there is any collaboration in the process?
I'll quote the book I've referenced, if that's alright: "...the moment my work became subject, authority could go fuck itself. Whether that be parent or guardian, counsellor or judge, cult-leader, professor, lender or landlord: At first, I'm goofy and sheepish, sorry that I'm late. Then maybe I forgot something, or didn't know you'd meant 'today'. Then I'm heard to say 'I'll be right back.' and disappear. Finally fortressed, get out my way at the threat of emotional weaponry: the work. And every time I've been afforded space, since, it has become fortress where social event is forbidden as if a sombre gateway. Impractical when having been granted only temporarily. But thinking of you from that furthest distance, a changeling son now exiled; this is my theme presenting."
Do you have a particular process of making that you could describe - where it begins, how you develop it, and whether there is any collaboration in the process?
I'll quote the book I've referenced, if that's alright: "...the moment my work became subject, authority could go fuck itself. Whether that be parent or guardian, counsellor or judge, cult-leader, professor, lender or landlord: At first, I'm goofy and sheepish, sorry that I'm late. Then maybe I forgot something, or didn't know you'd meant 'today'. Then I'm heard to say 'I'll be right back.' and disappear. Finally fortressed, get out my way at the threat of emotional weaponry: the work. And every time I've been afforded space, since, it has become fortress where social event is forbidden as if a sombre gateway. Impractical when having been granted only temporarily. But thinking of you from that furthest distance, a changeling son now exiled; this is my theme presenting."
Again, I could go on at length about what I'm actually 'doing' in that fortress of solitude, but I don't feel like it. Art...blah blah.
What do you feel the role of the audience is, in terms of making the meaning of your work?
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| Book of The Dead |
Just use the word 'improvisation' a lot and you'll do fine.
Moran's career was made by Philip Glass and he endlessly cites Philip Glass. Then he disses Philip Glass. He lost his support in NY by financially abusing many other mentors, collaborators and supporters. He sexually abuses the women he works with then publishes these conquests online like some pathetic teenager. The notion that he was a 'bulldog' for the financial integrity of BAM or any other arts institution is ludicrous. As for being suicidal that is one category he'll never fall into. He is way too vicious to off himself.
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