2023 - The Odyssey on Angel Island Soundtrack
We’re thrilled to announce the release of our The Odyssey on Angel Island album by Composer Charlie Gurke!
“We LOVED the concert - the joy that the musicians clearly have playing with each other, especially. It was challenging, bewitching and beguiling. Thank you We Players for always adding dimension to our world and our self awareness! “ - concert attendee
The album is downloadable from Bandcamp. Please leave a tip for our musicians if you can, in support of future musical projects!
Featuring:
Charlie Gurke - baritone saxophone/compositions
Steve Adams - alto saxophone
Jamie Dubberly - trombone
Henry Hung - trumpet
Luke Kirley - tuba
Eric Garland - drums
"Space and sound have an intimate and complex relationship. The shape of a space, as well as what it’s made of, determines its acoustic properties. Some spaces amplify sound, others absorb it, still others bounce sounds off surfaces, echoing off ceilings and floors and down corridors. Sites connote sound as well, provoking music from the imagination. Composers and musicians of all kinds have been inspired by geography and landscape, from folk songs to symphonies."
- Charlie Gurke, saxophonist, composer, educator, and We Players’ Music Director
The Score: The Odyssey on Angel Island
Charlie adapted and further developed his original score for new instrumentation and your listening pleasure.
The Tracks:
1. Ithaca
2. Penelope
3. The Wine Dark Sea
4. Aeolus
5. Wayfaring Stranger
6. Sirens
7. Exit Music
A bit of reminiscent, anecdotal context:
1. Ithaca
”Sing in me, Muse! And through me tell the story…”
The audience’s odyssey begins when they first board the boat, with ferries departing both San Francisco and Tiburon landing at Ayala Cove, which transforms into our Ithaca. Raucous suitors wrestle and coax audience into bouts of tug of war, while Penelope’s women tend fires over which the crackling skins of onions pop and smoke. The journey begins…
2. Penelope
Lonely Penelope weaves and waits, waits and weaves… Literally and figuratively tied to her home, a long braid of hand spun rope attaches the actor to the Angel Island visitor center. In this way, she is both safe from the suitors on the grassy field below the building, and also trapped, confined to the threshold but unable to escape.
3. The Wine Dark Sea
Following two traveling Bards, the audience are told a story in song while transiting the 5 mile perimeter loop around the island, encountering gods and monsters at every bend in the winding road. “
“And what if one of the gods does wreck me out on the wine-dark sea? I have a heart that is inured to suffering and I shall steel it to endure that too.”
4. Aeolus
Kites and pinwheels! Ribbons swiveling and swirling on silver sticks! An enormous parachute becomes a joyous game, then settles to the ground as a giant picnic cloth. After a grand dance on the great lawn, the audience follows the Wind King’s children into the confines of the Civil War era warehouse building. Inside, the skies darken, the door is suddenly barred, we hear Aelous, King of the Wind, laughing outside. His children seem anxious, troubled, increasingly agitated… Beware! The tempestuous teenagers, those wild, whirling wind kids!
5. Wayfaring Stranger
An old tune made new again…
An old story brought sparkling forth in new light…
An old suffering heart grows wings and reaches, reaches, striving, striving…
One day we’ll make it safely back to the shores of home…
6. Sirens
Elusive, seductive, dangerous… Sailors beware!
7. Exit Music
A new ending to an old story… Telemachus returns (audience in tow), but his father Odysseus has come and gone - that wily wanderer cannot seem to plant his feet. But the boy has become a man and now, reunited with his mother, will rebuild his home in Ithaca. Can the young one fulfill the ancient promise of the Philosopher King? Time will tell. For now, here we are: At the end where we began, the circle is complete but the cycle continues. We are the same, yet changed by the journey. We are ready to begin again. The boat is waiting, time to go home, where bread and bed will be all the more delicious after the arduous adventure.
“The rosy-fingered Dawn soon arrived upon her throne.”