Nine Nights' Love

One Week Till Showtime

2010-02-04T06:15:00.000-08:00

We've got our slinky nightgowns. We've got a set from the love motel. We have flint and fire and swords and suitcases. Plus, we have John Milton. It's gonna be one helluva ride.

Tickets Now at InfoSource

2010-02-02T13:24:00.000-08:00

Tickets will be available for sale at InfoSource (in the UCC Atrium) as of February 3. Admission is $7 ($5 for seniors and students).

EVENT INFO

2010-01-19T11:56:00.001-08:00

Dates: Feb. 11, 12, 13th
Time: 8:00 PM
Location: The University of Western Ontario, Conron Hall (UC 224)

Admission: $7 General, $5 Seniors/Students
Tickets available at the door or through infosource (in the UCC Atrium).

For more information, contact
tmurph3@uwo.ca

From Compiling to Composing

2010-01-19T11:48:00.000-08:00

The production team and I are happy to welcome Jason Noble to Nine Nights' Love. Jason will be composing original music to accompany the show.

Jason Noble is a composer, pianist and singer from St. John’s, NL. His pieces have been performed by the UWO Wind Ensemble, Newfoundland Symphony Orchestra, Primus Amabile Men’s Choir, Memorial University of Newfoundland Chamber and Festival Choirs, and numerous other ensembles and soloists. He is the author of children’s book The Stupendous Adventure of Gregory Green, for which he also composed music to accompany a narration by Canadian actor Gordon Pinsent. Among several upcoming performances, Jason is especially excited about the April premiere of his violin concerto The Trial of Socrates by the UWO Symphony Orchestra with soloist Mo Farag. He is a second-year masters student in composition at UWO.

AUDITION INFORMATION

2009-11-05T09:23:00.000-08:00

Auditions for Nine Nights' Love will be held in CONRON HALL (UC 224), the University of Western Ontario, on November 23 and 24th at 7 PM. First-come, first-serve. Auditions are open to all and no previous experience is required. It will be a cold reading, so there's no need to prepare a monologue--but for those of you who want to practice beforehand, I'd suggest reading some of John Donne's shorter poems. Having a sense for common Renaissance meters will be an advantage.

For more information, email me at tmurph3@uwo.ca.

Recitation Examples

2009-08-02T19:31:00.001-07:00

A series of readings by Matthew Macfayden is available to the right.

Here is John Gielgud reading Christina Rossetti's "The Birthday," and here is Gielgud's series on the metaphysical and devotional poets of the 17th century, featuring readings by Julian Glover. Following is Glover's reading of Marlowe's "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love".

Jeremy Irons also does a reading of Wordsworth's "Daffodils"(perhaps the most oft recited poem in English!) here.

For a taste of something more contemporary, try Alan Rickman's reading of Laurie Lee's "The Long War". And though the music etc. make the viewing hard, Rickman's reading of Sonnet 130 is also attractive.

Lastly, and if you can get your hands on it, the 6-volume audio cassette series put out by Penguin is worth its weight in gold. Readers include John Moffatt, Jill Balcon, Judi Dench, Michael Pennington, and Wilfred Owen.

Nine Nights' Love: The Concept

2009-08-02T09:50:00.000-07:00

And he made love to lovely-haired Mnemosyne, what is more:
To him the thrice three Muses, golden-filleted, she bore—
Festivity is their delight and pleasure in the song.
(Theogony ll. 915-17)

According to Hesiod, before Zeus became the ruler of Olympus, he spent nine nights in Pieria. Each night he lay with Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory, and each night Mnemosyne conceived: a year later, in an event that would become one of the most celebrated in poetical history, the Muses were born.

Little is known about Mnemosyne, and less about why Zeus lingered so long in her company. Could they have known what they were making together? Did they speak of it? Nine Nights’ Love is a verse recital program that attempts to reconstruct their interactions. Through a series of nine pillow-talk dialogues, each compiled from lyric poems and extracts, the humours, moods, passions, and exclamations of the lovers will be examined at the exact moment each art was engendered.

The dialogues will be approximately 10 minutes each, and their texts will be drawn from the verse and verse drama of the 17th century (with special attention paid to love poetry). Because independent poems will be delivered as if part of a conversation, each dialogue will give participants the opportunity to practice both formal recitation as well as some stage and gesture work.

My motivation for designing and directing this recital program is, first, to provide a local venue for the public performance of English verse. While London and UWO both have strong performance poetry communities, their shared focus on original works means there are few opportunities to hear classical non-dramatic texts performed aloud. Second, I feel it would be exciting to carry the momentum gained by our department’s summer and fall performances forward into the winter. Third, and ultimately, I would like to work towards making public verse recitals a recurring event at Western (if on a smaller scale than that of Nine Nights’ Love). I think regular recitals of poetry would provide students with a wonderful opportunity to memorize texts they cherish, and to gain performance experience.