United Theater Concert: "Memoir"

Memoir is an adaptation of composer Steven Mackey\’s mother’s memoir which gives the process and the product a heightened personal connection. The script is a series of short vignettes which trace Elaine Mackey’s life as a first-generation American, born in Steel Town USA, coming of age in the Great Depression, escaping an ill-fated Hollywood marriage to work for the Department of Defense in post-war Europe and raising a family in Northern California in the volatile 60’s. Memoir covers familiar themes of love, loss, gender roles, and social mores ensconced in her intense personal struggle with alcoholism and its stigma.

\”The combination of the Dover Quartet and arx duo (percussion) is ideally suited for Memoir. There are plenty of opportunities to employ the grave expressivity idiomatic to the string quartet as well as the playful spirit, wit and irony made possible by the surprising variety of sounds available to a percussion duo. The string quartet has a particular knack for warm, emotional and profound musical expression and the diverse, often surprising timbral possibilities of the percussion duo brings witt, irony, and a playful spirit to the stage.\” –Steven Mackey