The tone is almost theatrical, mixing the commanding voice of a single actor onstage with precise stage directions.
This recalls a classical Greek chorus, punctuating what is otherwise the voice of a single narrator; that of one of Grandpa's grandchildren, an eagle-eyed child who watches the lives of those around him unfold.
The work, composed in 1731, presents each season through the voice of a single singer: Spring is a soprano (Jessica Tranzillo); Summer is a mezzo-soprano (Barbara Hollinshead Autumnmn is a tenor (Philip Anderson), and Winter is a bass (Paul Shipper).
But artistically, Robinson chose for her protagonist the voice of a single woman, a transient in her 20s looking back on her childhood, and this character dictates the cast and setting of the novel just as much as the voice of Ishmael dictates the setting and cast of his narrative.
The program seemed less about words per se than about what the music is saying: contrasting words and music, rather than combining them, with the voice of a single singer as an interesting contrast to the Emerson's democratic blend of sound, with all four voices equally present even when there's a clear melody.
And now, with sounds of explosive celebration from Cairo via Al Jazeera in my ears, interspersed with the voice of a single man singing the Egyptian national anthem all by himself (as if this were a private moment), a stunned joy of sorts is slowly awakening.
Dave Winer, a software engineer who pioneered several blogging technologies, and who keeps what by his own estimate is the longest-running blog of all (dating back to 1997), has argued that the essence of blogginess is "the unedited voice of a single person", preferably an amateur.
Diller: And you buy it because it is absolutely the voice of a single person primarily, with some other people working for him — but it's Michael Arrington's voice, and you know when you buy it, that that voice is biased and mean and capable of saying anything, and is playing a hundred different games.
The majority of my favourite books are the kind that can manage to juggle dozens of ideas and tones at the same time, and here Helen DeWitt does that in the unlikely voice of a single stay-at-home mom.
The majority of my favorite books are the kind that can manage to juggle dozens of ideas and tones at the same time, and here Helen DeWitt does that in the unlikely voice of a single stay-at-home mom.
