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photo courtesy of Cohn Dutcher Associates
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"Civilization and Its Discontents" CD
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Michael Sahl and Eric Salzman’s award-winning conceptual “Civilization and its Discontents” debuted in 1978 and is now re-released on Labor Records from the Nonesuch original. The work is a combination of performance art, which is presented in the form of a radio show-cum-opera-cum-experimental theatre piece and has elements of opera–grand and less so; humor; and theatre references, which feel like we’re in the way-back machine, but were very topical at the time. It’s also a cross-section of New Yorkers’ lives, in the late 1970s-early-’80s, time that shares its name with a slim volume by Sigmund Freud about the world and what’s wrong with it. The book was published in 1930 and, while it is only 127 pages, it states that humans’ instinctual behavior, while gratifying to the individual, does not always support the needs of the human community. Consequently, we make laws to enforce that community support. Ultimately, however, humans are governed by the pursuit of pleasure and that pleasurable satisfaction is what satisfies the instinct to act for gratification of the individual. Civilization lies in turning that energy toward the good of the group—or something of that nature ….
More than 50 years after Freud, this piece gives us a peripatetic view of the pursuit of that human pleasure that gave us club dancing, one-night stands, and the self-absorption that, these days, is centered on pocket-sized devices that provide still greater and even more instant gratification. In the elements of opera, presented à la musical theatre, an interesting story teases itself out in recitative and sound bytes. Listening to this album is like opening a time capsule, as it combines ’70s-style Broadway with Latin rhythm and operatic canons and multi-voice polyphony.
Does the story mean anything? It means no more and no less than our present everyday lives. This album could be the premise of a STARZ or Showtime series, so give it a listen and walk back in time. Look around, you might see people you know in Club Bide-a Wee. If you need a ride home, look for Mr. Peabody and his boy Sherman. This CD is full of surprises and, while it’s hard to believe, Freud may have been right!
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