OM Webstore: Ezra Pound's Le Testament

Ezra Pound
<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?OtherMinds/5e1e7ed3ec/d50af16e86/3150f40007>Le 
Testament "Paroles de Villon" (2008)
Edited by Margaret Fisher and Robert Hughes
Edition of 200, paperback, 270 pages
$85

Le Testament "Paroles de Villon," Ezra Pound's legendary first opera, is 
now available in print 75 years after its completion.

Part One presents the editor's reconstruction of the 1926 Paris Salle 
Pleyel Concert version, composed by Pound to preview nine numbers from the 
opera on a new 5/8 basis, after having no success getting performances of 
the irrational and difficult meters presented in the urtext 1923 score, 
edited for him by George Antheil. Pound reduced the performing forces to 
tenor, bass-baritone, and small chamber ensemble (violin, 2 trombones, 
harpsichord, kettle drums) and added an overture for a long horn he named 
"cornet de dessus" to demonstrate his theory of Great Bass.

Part Two contains the recently discovered final version of the opera penned 
by Pound in 1933. For this complete version, Pound further revised the 
rhythms of many of the numbers and adjusted his performing forces to nine 
or more singers and 10-12 instruments.

The book contains an introduction by R. Murray Schafer, 13 facsimile 
reproductions of Pound's holograph scores, staging instructions, libretto, 
background information, and editor's notes.

<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?OtherMinds/5e1e7ed3ec/d50af16e86/60186f2a97>>>Order 
now