Elodie Lauten

Elodie Lauten (b. October 20, 1950) is a composer described as postminimalist or a microtonalist. She is a former student of her father Errol Parker and of LaMonte Young, Dinu Ghezzo, and Akhmal Parwez. A writer of operas, theater pieces, orchestral, chamber and instrumental music, she is recognized in North America and Europe as a pioneer of postminimalism and a force on the new music scene with over 20 releases on a number of labels including Lovely Music, Point/Polygram, 4-Tay, O.O. Discs, and New Tone (Italy). Her music has a strong mystical streak, reflected in correspondences between astrological signs, hexagrams of the I Ching, animals, and the modes of her system of improvisation, called Universal Mode Improvisation (UMI).

Lauten's music has always been a combination of two contradictory streams, one of them a cloudy, beatless stasis derived from minimalism, the other a neoclassical attachment to tonal melody and ostinato. These two were present from the beginning of her recording career, the first in her Concerto for Piano and Orchestral Memory (1984), the second in her Sonata Ordinaire (1986) for piano. Her 1987 opera The Death of Don Juan—feminist tract and Zen meditation combined—was one of the major postminimalist works of the 1980s; it has recently been revived in a 2-week run (April 2005) at Franklin Pierce College, NH, directed by Robert Lawson. Her neoclassical tendency blossomed into a full neo-baroque idiom in her Deus ex Machina Cycle for voices and Baroque ensemble (1999). Variations On The Orange Cycle (1991, recorded by Lois Svard for Lovely Music in 1998) is one of the cloudier works, an improvisation in a Terry Riley-ish vein that was recorded and transcribed (as few of her piano works have been) for performance by others. The work has been included in Chamber Music America's list of 100 best works of the 20th century.

Lauten's opera Waking in New York, written on poems by her late friend Allen Ginsberg, was presented by the New York City Opera VOX and Friends 2004, after being released on 4Tay in 2003. Smoothly suave but with a gentle rock beat, the work pioneered a mixture of genres by combining vocal soloists from three styles; classical, Broadway, and gospel. Orfreo, an opera for Baroque ensemble, was premiered at Merkin Hall by the Queen's Chamber Band, who also included Lauten's The Architect in their CD New Music Alive (Capstone, 2004). Orfreo was released on CD in December 2004 (Studio 21). In 2004 Lauten was composer-in-residence at Hope College, MI. Lauten's Symphony 2001 was premiered in February 2003 by the SEM Orchestra in New York. Some of her compositions are for an instrument called the "trine," a lyre-like instrument she designed.

Born in Paris, France, Lauten was classically trained as a pianist since age 7. She received a Master's in composition from New York University where she studied Western composition with Dinu Ghezzo and Indian classical music with Ahkmal Parwez. She became an American citizen in 1984 and has lived in New York since the early seventies. Lauten has received awards from the NEA, ASCAP, MTC, and AMC, as well as chamber and orchestral commissions. She owns a recording label and publishing, Studio 21, and produces CDs for other artists on a regular basis. In France she is known by some happy-few to have contribute to the early punk-rock scéne in Paris in 1976/77.

Works

Chamber music
Links, solo flute, 2004
The Wish of the Quickening Moon, string quartet, 2003
Sex and Pre-Anti-Post Modernism, contrabass/voice, setting of text by Michael Andre, 2002
T.E.V.B. (The Elusive Virgin Bachelor), trio (piano, violin, cello), 2002
Space-Time Sextet, string sextet (3 violins, viola, cello, contrabass), 2001
Mantra, vocal sextet, 2001
American Dreamscape, solo piano, 2000
Lunaticity, Baroque ensemble, 1999
Prophecy, solo viola, 1999
Irrational Synergies, baritone, flute, clarinet, saxophone, cello; setting of poems by Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, E. E. Cummings, commissioned by The Lark Ascending, 1998
Discombobulations, electronic, electric guitar, flute, and soprano, lyrics by Steven Hall, 1997
Variations on the Orange Cycle, solo piano, 1991
Concerto for Piano and Orchestral Memory, piano, tape, synthesizer, cello, trombone, violin, viola, 1984

Dance
The Soundless Sound, electronic, 2004
She-Wolf, electronic (Fairlight computer), 1987
Oedipus Rex, electronic/computer (Fairlight), 1984

Operas & Cycles
The Death of Don Juan, revision of 1985 opera, 2005
Orfreo, soprano, mezzo, countertenor, baritone, and Baroque orchestra: harpsichord, string quartet, oboe, flute, contrabass; libretto by Michael Andre, commissioned by Harpsichord Unlimited, 2004
Waking in New York, baritone, soprano, mezzo, full orchestra, libretto by Allen Ginsberg, 2004
Waking in New York, soprano, mezzo, baritone, string quartet, flute, contrabass, percussion, synthesizer, libretto by Allen Ginsberg, 1999
The Deus Ex Machina Cycle, two sopranos, baritone, harpsichord, string quartet, flute; libretto by: Lauten, Rilke, Verlaine, Pascal, Melody Sumner Carnahan, Steven Hall, 1995
Existence, yenor, soprano, mezzo-soprano and narrator, piano, synthesizer, percussion; music and libretto by Lauten, 1990
The Death of Don Juan, computer generated tape, 4 sopranos, harpsichord, Trine (custom lyre), cello, synthesizer, Grand Trine (custom harp); music and libretto by Lauten, 1985

Orchestral
Harmonic Protection Circle, 2003
Symphony 2001, 2000

Soundtracks
Crossroads Variations, solo piano, 2004
Harmonic Protection Circle 2004, synthesizer, electric guitar, percussion, contrabass, 2004
Harmonic Protection Circle 2003, Trine, electric guitar, 2003
The Mystery of the Elements, piano, electronic, 2002
S.O.S.W.T.C., electronic, 2001
Double X , electronic, voice, flute, 1999
Inscapes from Exile , electronic, 1995
Tronik Involutions, electronic, 1993
Remembrance of Things Past, electronic, cello, music for sound installation based on the writing of Marcel Proust, 1988
Untitled , 5 pieces for live Fairlight computer, electric violin, cello, Trine, piano; commissioned by the Lincoln Center Serious Fun Series, 1988
Blue Rhythms, piano and electronic, 1987
Krash Music, electronic, singers, 1986
Sonate Ordinaire, solo piano, 1986
Sonate Modale, piano and tape, 1985
Action Music , piano and sound environment, 1985
Music for the Trine, a custom-designed amplified lyre, electronic, Trine, voice, cello, 1985
Magnetic Fields, electronic, Trine, 1985
The Soundless Sound, electronic, 1984
The Enigma of a Lovely/Loveless Existence, concrete, Casiotone, voice, 1983
Piano Works, piano, concrete, synthesizer, 1983