KING OEDIPUS
semi opera by HARRY PARTCH
text by SOPHOCLES OF COLONOS
translated and edited by W B YEATS.
This work was explicitly written to try to recreate the overall musicodramatic/semi-operatic nature of how the ancient Attic Tragedies were originally performed in its composition, instrumentation, and performance. Partch even famously created his own instruments which could play microtonal intervals, so he could get at the "pure intonation" of ancient Greek music. It can be a bit unsettling at times, but there is a real beauty to it as well. It is mostly percussive and rhythmic, and is very convincingly ancient in overall tone. (Kind of weird in how the final scene with Creon and Oedipus being banished is cut, but it still works)
Oedipus is a manic and powerful figure in this interpretation. Jocasta and the Chorus Leader both have kind of weak voices that don't carry next to him or the extremely dramatic Partch as Tiresias and the Old Shepherd, but they are servicable.
Really worth listening to. I could have gone for more music underneath the dialogic sections more consistently, but still good.