Commissioned by the Library Foundation of Los Angeles.
First performed March 8, 2016 by WasteLAnd at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles: Stephanie Aston (soprano), Andrew Dwan (baritone), Linnea Powell (viola), Nicholas Deyoe (banjo, guitar), Justin DeHart (vibes, percussion), Mark Menzies, conductor.
A – Zythum depicts all words appearing on the spines of the Oxford English Dictionary during its first publication period from 1884 – 1928. Two words that begin and end the dictionary, A; Zythum, frame this raucous accounting. “Hobbit” and “Walrus,” as defined by J.R.R. Tolkien, emerge from and temporarily halt the chronologically ordered stream of words labeling each volume in the series. Two ‘ghost words’ are embedded in the body of the score: Dord; Abacot (impostors that escaped the editors’ scrutiny and were published but actually did not exist).
A – Zythum unfolds in three sections:
1. the letter A
2. A – Zythum
3. the last word
Performance of this work requires additional media.
