Activism in the Arts Kevin Madill

Activism in the Arts: I’ve Got U Under My Skin: AIDS & Classical Music

Kevin Madill
 

Activism in the Arts: I’ve Got U Under My Skin: AIDS & Clas­si­cal Music is an exhi­bi­tion com­prised of print scores, audio record­ings, and an accom­pa­ny­ing QR code lis­ten­ing list curat­ed by Kevin Madill, Music Librar­i­an, the Uni­ver­si­ty of British Colum­bia (UBC). Works exhib­it­ed were select­ed from the music col­lec­tion of UBC’s Library or bor­rowed from anony­mous lenders. The exhi­bi­tion runs from Sep­tem­ber 15, 2022, to Jan­u­ary 15, 2023, in the foy­er of the UBC Music Art and Archi­tec­ture Library of the Irv­ing K. Bar­ber Learn­ing Centre.

I grew up in small towns across rur­al Cana­da. I was liv­ing in a small town in South­ern Ontario when I came across the first guy who got it. He was a Black kid. Nobody liked him. He was a lon­er. He was even estranged from his par­ents when he found out. Regard­less, they agreed to take him in. They put him in a back room, cut a hole in the door, and fed him water and food through it. He died in that room, unable to get out of bed to feed him­self, or go to the bath­room. He prob­a­bly died in his feces of star­va­tion before the worst kicked in. And that was just the beginning.

I’ve loved clas­si­cal music since hear­ing Tchaikovsky’s Waltz of the Flow­ers on Cana­di­an Broad­cast­ing Cor­po­ra­tion radio at the ten­der age of 4. But where was that music dur­ing the years of pain, loss, and fear. Research­ing for this exhi­bi­tion, I found blogs, con­certs, and record­ings mark­ing the moment. But no exhi­bi­tions to draw atten­tion to the numer­ous clas­si­cal music scores ded­i­cat­ed to remem­ber­ing. It’s been near­ly forty years. This can’t real­ly be the first exhi­bi­tion to point to clas­si­cal music and ask what it had to say about it all? Really?

What lies below is an oppor­tu­ni­ty. An oppor­tu­ni­ty for some­one much younger to push off the sum­ma­riza­tion of ideas and sam­ples I list. All for the pur­pose of build­ing a bet­ter remem­ber­ing. Some­thing stronger. Some­thing last­ing. Some­thing that refus­es to give up and creep away when giv­en the oppor­tu­ni­ty to forget.

Exhibition

One thing is cer­tain with age: the accu­mu­la­tion of per­son­al his­to­ry. Some of it you may want to for­get. Some of it you can’t help but for­get. And some of it you should nev­er for­get. For those of us old enough to have lived a part of our adult lives through the 1980s and 90s, the AIDS cri­sis falls into the lat­ter category.

Projects deter­mined not to let fade the his­to­ry of the begin­ning of the AIDS pan­dem­ic include the book Let the Record Show: A Polit­i­cal His­to­ry of ACT UP New York, 1987-1993 (Schul­man, 2021); the archive HIV In My Day (Uni­ver­si­ty of Vic­to­ria, 2022) com­prised of oral his­to­ry inter­views of British Columbian long-term HIV sur­vivors and their care­givers; and the archive AIDS Activist His­to­ry Project (Car­leton Uni­ver­si­ty, n.d.) that pro­vides open access to mate­ri­als gath­ered from HIV/AIDS social move­ment orga­niz­ers active across Cana­da in the 1980s and 1990s.

Join­ing such projects is I’ve Got U Under My Skin: AIDS & Clas­si­cal Music, an exhi­bi­tion of 26 scores and record­ings care­ful­ly select­ed from an aca­d­e­m­ic library’s music col­lec­tion and serv­ing to make evi­dent the com­plex­i­ties that char­ac­ter­ized the clas­si­cal music scene’s response to the begin­ning of the AIDS pan­dem­ic. Var­i­ous themes emerge and inter­sect through sound, score, and pack­ag­ing: health edu­ca­tion, com­mu­ni­ty build­ing, sense mak­ing, con­cretiza­tion of past events, and expres­sion of loss.

Figure 1: Three Vitrines and a Piano

Tak­ing cen­tre stage in health edu­ca­tion is the Chrysalis Records 1990 release Red Hot + Blue, a vinyl LP dou­ble album offer­ing up con­tem­po­rary pop musi­cians per­form­ing cov­er ver­sions of Cole Porter songs. Pro­ceeds from sales went to ben­e­fit AIDS research. The print­ed inner sleeves serve as a vehi­cle for health edu­ca­tion, packed with infor­ma­tion under head­ings such as “what aids is + isn’t” and “what to do about it.” In her adap­ta­tion of I’ve Got U Under My Skin (1990), Neneh Cher­ry com­bines pop, rap, and clas­si­cal gen­res to exhort lis­ten­ers to: “Wake up to real­i­ty.” “Share your love. Don’t share the nee­dle.” Cherry’s mes­sage, when pro­mot­ed as a sin­gle, reached a wide audi­ence hit­ting num­ber 25 on the UK charts (Offi­cial Charts Com­pa­ny, n.d.). Adja­cent to Red Hot + Blue but com­ing from halfway round the world are the win­ning scores from the UNICEF Malawi fund­ed 1991 and 1994 choral com­pe­ti­tions. UNICEF Malawi is a non-gov­ern­men­tal orga­ni­za­tion based in Lilong­we known for using dance and music to advo­cate for the rights of chil­dren and women (UNICEF Malawi, n.d.). Matthews Ezra Chadza’s Women, Avoid AIDS (1991) and Yobbe Lungu’s Care for the AIDS Patient (1994) bring the social prac­tice of gath­er­ing to sing into the domain of prac­ti­cal health edu­ca­tion tools.

The gal­va­niz­ing role of com­mu­ni­ties dur­ing the ear­ly stages of the AIDS pan­dem­ic is doc­u­ment­ed in the exhi­bi­tion through rep­re­sen­ta­tion of com­mu­ni­ties that are less famil­iar. Arthur Russell’s Instru­men­tals (2017) and Coil’s Theme from the Gay Man’s Guide to Safer Sex (1992) are select­ed from the under­ground and exper­i­men­tal music scenes of New York City and Lon­don respec­tive­ly. The 1992 Gay Man’s Guide to Safer Sex was an instruc­tion­al doc­u­men­tary fund­ed through Pride Video and the Ter­rence Hig­gins Trust, a British char­i­ty sup­port­ing ser­vices in sex­u­al health. The video was updat­ed in 1997 and is still in dis­tri­b­u­tion. One exhi­bi­tion vit­rine is giv­en over to the works of women com­posers: Pauline Oliv­eros, Mered­ith Monk, Jani­ka Van­dervelde, Jan­ice Giteck, Annea Lock­wood, and Lau­ra Kamin­sky. Vandervelde’s Pos­i­tive Women: Susan (1997) for nar­ra­tor, female cho­rus, and vio­lin bol­sters the efforts of AIDS sur­vivors to speak for them­selves by set­ting to music Susan Gladstone’s first-per­son nar­ra­tive orig­i­nal­ly pub­lished in the 1992 alter­na­tive press paper­back Pos­i­tive Women: Voic­es of Women Liv­ing with AIDS (Rudd, Taylor).

Figure 2: From Sheet Music to CD and Vinyl

The ear­ly years of AIDS for some com­posers were just as con­found­ing as they were ter­ri­fy­ing. Theirs was a strug­gle with how to make sense of the moment. Neely Bruce in The plague (1991) for vocal quar­tet and elec­tron­ics and Mered­ith Monk in Plague: for mixed voic­es (2014) turn to the past in a search for under­stand­ing. Par­al­lels are drawn between the Bubon­ic Plague of the 14th cen­tu­ry and its impact on Medieval Europe and AIDS and its impact on con­tem­po­rary soci­ety. Monk builds a bridge to the past through musi­cal style and con­tent that allows her to con­clude that “suf­fer­ing, igno­rance, and vio­lence are con­stants through­out his­to­ry as are joy, com­pas­sion, and love” (Jowitt, 1997, p. 156). The 2017 per­for­mance of Monk’s Plague by the Young People’s Cho­rus of New York City is a tes­ta­ment to the abil­i­ty of youth from one gen­er­a­tion to achieve an empa­thet­ic and sen­si­tive read­ing of a defin­ing moment that shaped another.

Clas­si­cal musi­cians var­ied in how they chose to cap­ture that tur­bu­lent moment and con­cretize it in their music. Bob Ostertag cap­tures his­tor­i­cal imme­di­a­cy in All the Rage (1993), an exper­i­men­tal album with the Kro­nos Quar­tet, by includ­ing record­ed sound from the 1991 AB101 Veto Riot, San Fran­cis­co, an action incit­ed by Cal­i­for­nia gov­er­nor Pete Wilson’s pro­scrip­tion of pro-gay leg­is­la­tion. Robert Mag­gio in Win­ter Toc­ca­ta: I Can’t Believe You Want To Die (1996) for solo cel­lo riffs off of Lar­ry Kramer’s 1989 Reports From the Holo­caust: The Mak­ing Of An AIDS Activist. Mag­gio turns the cel­lo line into Kramer’s voice “imi­tat­ing the dri­ving rhythms of this writ­ing, cre­at­ing melodies out of favourite sen­tences” (Mag­gio, n.d.). Fol­low­ing a request to com­pos­er Lyle Chan for a phys­i­cal copy of his score String Quar­tet: An AIDS Activist’s Mem­oir (L. Chan, per­son­al cor­re­spon­dence, May 31, 2022), Chan gen­er­ous­ly includ­ed notes on how he embed­ded into the com­po­si­tion his expe­ri­ences as an AIDS activist in NYC dur­ing the peak of the AIDS cri­sis. An excerpt from the score shows Chan’s trans­la­tion of ACT UP’s sig­na­ture chant “ACT UP Fight Back Fight AIDS!” into music. And there can be no bet­ter exam­ple of close­ness to the moment than Robert Savage’s AIDS Ward Scher­zo (1992) writ­ten by the com­pos­er while on his hos­pi­tal bed.

Cul­tur­al expres­sions of loss abound across artis­tic move­ments, gen­res, and for­mats. The ear­ly years of AIDS are no excep­tion. For Richard by Annea Lock­wood was the composer’s con­tri­bu­tion to the AIDS Quilt Song­book (1993) itself ded­i­cat­ed to bari­tone William Park­er who ini­ti­at­ed and brought the song­book project to life. String Quar­tet No. 4 “Buczak” (2000) was com­mis­sioned from com­pos­er Philip Glass by Geof­frey Hen­dricks in remem­brance of fel­low artist, Bri­an Buczak. Jan­ice Giteck’s Om Shan­ti: To Peo­ple Liv­ing with AIDS (2019) was com­mis­sioned by the Insti­tute for Move­ment Ther­a­py in Seat­tle after the loss of the Institute’s Direc­tor, Peter Guiler.

Figure 3: Meredith and Julius

Remem­ber­ing is the antithe­sis of for­get­ting. Phys­i­cal objects such as the scores and record­ings pre­sent­ed are pow­er­ful moti­va­tors for the act of remem­ber­ing. But what of the objects and their own his­to­ries? Not all objects of inter­est sur­vive to ful­fill their role in moti­vat­ing remem­ber­ing. Julius East­man, whose music explores queer and Black rad­i­cal pol­i­tics, is rep­re­sent­ed in the exhi­bi­tion with the LP Stay On It (2022) and the score Pre­lude to the Holy Pres­ence of Joan d’Arc: Solo vocal impro­vi­sa­tion (2021). East­man died alone and des­ti­tute in 1990, liv­ing briefly in Tomp­kins Square Park. His record­ings and scores were con­fis­cat­ed when he failed to pay rent and much of his work is now lost. The New York Pub­lic Library took action dur­ing the ear­ly years of the AIDS pan­dem­ic to save what it could from the stu­dios of NYC artists and com­posers lost to AIDS. Mate­ri­als gath­ered now lie in an exten­sive insti­tu­tion­al archival fonds (New York Pub­lic Library, Archives & Man­u­scripts, n.d.). Not all of the cre­ators’ estates, how­ev­er, have agreed to allow the Library to make the work pub­lic. With­out doc­u­men­ta­tion, works are lost. With­out per­mis­sion, works such as those of Robert Sav­age can’t be acces­sioned into any library and must remain unpub­lished, hid­den, and forgotten.

Figure 4: Moments of Activism in the Musical Arts

Pho­to cred­its © Kevin Madill, Robert Ablenas

About the Author / Kevin Madill is Music Librar­i­an at the Uni­ver­si­ty of British Colum­bia (UBC). Pre­vi­ous posi­tions include admin­is­tra­tor, man­ag­er, and liaison/collections librar­i­an in aca­d­e­m­ic and spe­cial libraries in the Unit­ed States and Cana­da includ­ing the Muse­um of Mod­ern Art, New York, and Pratt Insti­tute, Brook­lyn. He has served as Adjunct Fac­ul­ty with the UBC Mas­ter of Library and Infor­ma­tion Stud­ies pro­gram where he taught col­lec­tion devel­op­ment. He holds a Mas­ter of Library and Infor­ma­tion Stud­ies from UBC, a BMus (Hon­ors, The­o­ry and Com­po­si­tion) from West­ern Uni­ver­si­ty, and an MFA and BFA from UBC. Kevin’s cre­ative work explores the inter­con­nect­ed­ness of moder­ni­ty, sex­u­al iden­ti­ty, and por­trai­ture. His art­works are held by sev­er­al muse­ums in the Pacif­ic North West and avail­able for online view­ing through the solo exhi­bi­tion Van­cou­ver Mod­ern: on the lim­its of por­trai­ture.

WORKS CITED

Archives

Car­leton Uni­ver­si­ty (n.d.). AIDS Activist His­to­ry Project. https://​aid​s​ac​tivisthis​to​ry​.ca/

New York Pub­lic Library, Archives & Man­u­scripts (n.d.). Estate Project for Artists with AIDS records 1989-1999. https://​archives​.nypl​.org/​m​s​s​/​4​7​9​8​#​o​v​e​r​v​iew

New York Pub­lic Library, Archives & Man­u­scripts (n.d.). Robert Sav­age col­lec­tion 1975-1994. https://​archives​.nypl​.org/​m​u​s​/​2​2​312

Uni­ver­si­ty of Vic­to­ria (2022). HIV In My Day. https://​vault​.library​.uvic​.ca/​c​o​l​l​e​c​t​i​o​n​s​/​d​4​f​e​e​b​a​5​-​d​1​b​d​-​4​b​4​c​-​b​9​5​0​-​6​0​2​b​f​9​3​a​5​23d

Monographs

Jowitt, D. (1997). Mered­ith Monk. Johns Hop­kins Uni­ver­si­ty Press.

Kramer, L. (1994). Reports from the holo­caust : the sto­ry of an AIDS activist / Lar­ry Kramer ; [fore­word by Simon Wat­ney]. (Updat­ed and expand­ed.). St. Martin’s Press.

Rudd, A., Tay­lor, D. (1992). Pos­i­tive Women: Voic­es of Women Liv­ing with AIDS. Sumach Press.

Schul­man, S. (2021). Let the record show: A polit­i­cal his­to­ry of ACT UP New York, 1987-1993 (First ed.). Far­rar, Straus and Giroux.

Recordings

Bruce, N., McClure, M., Whit­man, W., Elec­tric Phoenix (Musi­cal group) (1991). Eight ghosts: The dream of the oth­er dream­ers ; The plague [Com­pact disc]. Mode Records.

East­man, J. (2022). Stay on it [Album]. Week-End Records.

Ostertag, B., Miles, S., Gup­ton, E., Kro­nos Quar­tet (1993). All the rage [Com­pact disc]. Elek­tra Nonesuch.

Porter, C., Cher­ry, N., O’Connor, S., Keïta, S., Har­ry, D., Pop, I., Mac­Coll, K., Byrne, D., Waits, T., Lennox, A., Lang, k d, Stans­field, L., Somerville, J., Wat­ley, J. (1990). Red, hot & blue [2 Albums]. Lon­don: Chrysalis.

Rus­sell, A. (2017). Instru­men­tals (Reis­sued) [2 Albums + Book]. Audi­ka Records.

Wusten­burg, R. (2015, May 3). For Richard (Annea Lock­wood) [Stream­ing audio]. Sound­Cloud. https://​sound​cloud​.com/​r​u​s​s​e​l​l​-​w​u​s​t​e​n​b​e​r​g​/​0​3​-​f​o​r​-​r​i​c​h​ard

Scores

Chadza, M., Siabu, M., Phiri, K. (1992). Three choral com­po­si­tions on AIDS pre­ven­tion [Musi­cal score]. Zom­ba, Malawi : Choral Work­shop Publications.

East­man, J. (2021). Pre­lude to the holy pres­ence of Joan d’Arc: For solo vocal impro­vi­sa­tion [Musi­cal score]. Music Sales Corporation.

Giteck, J., Śaṅkarācārya A. (2019). Om shan­ti: To peo­ple liv­ing with AIDS : Sopra­no, flute, B♭ clar­inet, vio­lin, cel­lo, per­cus­sion, piano, syn­the­siz­er [Musi­cal score]. Frog Peak Music.

Glass, P. (2000). String quar­tet no. 4: Buczak [Musi­cal score]. Chester Music.

Lun­gu, Y. (1994). Four choral com­po­si­tions on AIDS pre­ven­tion and care, child spac­ing, and ben­e­fits of vac­ci­nat­ing chil­dren [Musi­cal score]. Zom­ba, Malawi : Choral Work­shop Publications.

Mag­gio, R. (1996). Win­ter toc­ca­ta: (I can’t believe you want to die) : Solo cel­lo [Musi­cal score]. T. Presser.

Monk, M. (2014). Plague: For mixed voic­es (Sec­ond print­ing: March 2014. ed.) [Musi­cal score]. Boosey & Hawkes.

Park­er, W., Whee­lock, D., Her­sch, F., Mus­to, J., Rorem, N., DeBla­sio, C., Krakauer, D., Lock­wood, A., St. Pierre, D., Bol­com, W., Thomas, R. P., Har­bi­son, J., Byron, C., Hoi­by, L., Brown, E., Gor­don, R. I., Wil­son, R., Larsen, L., & Houtz, S. (1993). The AIDS quilt song­book [Musi­cal score]. Boosey & Hawkes.

Porter, C., & Day, R. (1991). Red hot + blue [Musi­cal score]. Warn­er Chap­pell Music.

Sav­age, R. (1992). Aids Ward Scher­zo [Musi­cal score]. This work is unavail­able for legal reasons.

Van­dervelde, J., Glad­stone, S. (1997). Pos­i­tive Women, Susan [Musi­cal score]. Earthsongs.

Videos

Aca­cia Quar­tet (2020, August 12). “In Sep­tem­ber the Light Changes” from “String Quar­tet: An Aids Activist’s Mem­oir in Music” (Lyle Chan) [Video]. YouTube. https://​youtu​.be/​w​s​E​c​z​J​N​Q​X​b​g​?​l​i​s​t​=​O​L​A​K​5​u​y​_​k​e​4​E​C​c​k​4​q​6​h​7​1​N​N​z​0​o​i​j​X​i​W​B​6​w​6​T​B​b​sHY

Con­cert­ge­bouwork­est (2022, Sep­tem­ber 24). Nut­crack­er suite op.71a Flower Waltz (Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky) [Video]. YouTube. https://​youtu​.be/​Z​p​1​a​D​n​V​y​Sf8

Cur­tis Insti­tute of Music (2020, April 27). Pre­lude to the Holy Pres­ence of Joan d’Arc (Julius East­man) [Video]. YouTube. https://​youtu​.be/​r​O​E​N​Q​b​5​T​z38

John Koen (2020, April 3). Win­ter Toc­ca­ta (I can’t believe you want to die) : I. Lament­ing and Rag­ing (Robert Mag­gio) [Video]. YouTube. https://​youtu​.be/​p​W​f​i​n​N​z​w​Pdo

Kro­nos Quar­tet (2017, July 21). String Quar­tet No. 4 (Buczak) : III. (Philip Glass) [Video]. YouTube. https://​youtu​.be/​X​k​Q​A​1​k​P​t​oLo

McBride, S. (1992). Gay Men’s Guide to Safer Sex (Remas­tered 2019) [Video]. Inter­net Archive. https://​archive​.org/​d​e​t​a​i​l​s​/​G​a​y​_​M​a​n​s​_​G​u​i​d​e​_​2​0​1​9​_​R​e​m​a​s​ter

NAXOS of Amer­i­ca (2014, Sep­tem­ber 26). Pos­i­tive Women: Susan (Jani­ka Van­de­velde) [Video]. YouTube. https://​youtu​.be/​K​g​N​M​Y​7​z​I​KNU

The Orchard Enter­pris­es (2015, Feb­ru­ary 21). AIDS Ward Scher­zo (Robert Sav­age) [Video]. YouTube. https://​youtu​.be/​m​Z​z​S​E​X​2​f​BBA

Young People’s Cho­rus of New York City (2017, Octo­ber 21). “Plague” from Mered­ith Monk’s “Danc­ing Voic­es” with Young People’s Cho­rus of New York City (Mered­ith Monk) [Video]. YouTube. https://​youtu​.be/​v​l​a​I​4​p​c​y​m0k

Zoppo9999 (2009, Novem­ber 29). I’ve Got You Under My Skin (Neneh Cher­ry) [Video]. YouTube. https://​youtu​.be/​2​9​J​2​B​2​F​I​gt0

Websites

Mag­gio. R. (n.d.). Robert Mag­gio | com­pos­er and col­lab­o­ra­tor | Win­ter Toc­ca­ta (I can’t believe you want to die) – 1993. https://​www​.robert​mag​gio​.com/​c​o​m​p​o​s​i​t​i​o​n​/​w​i​n​t​e​r​-​t​o​c​c​a​t​a​-​i​-​c​a​n​t​-​b​e​l​i​e​v​e​-​y​o​u​-​w​a​n​t​-​t​o​-​d​ie/

Neneh Cher­ry | Full Offi­cial Chart His­to­ry | Offi­cial Charts Com­pa­ny (n.d.). https://​www​.offi​cialcharts​.com/​a​r​t​i​s​t​/​2​5​1​9​8​/​n​e​n​e​h​-​c​h​e​r​ry/

UNICEF Malawi (n.d.). Music in Africa | UNICEF Malawi | Bio. https://​www​.music​i​nafrica​.net/​d​i​r​e​c​t​o​r​y​/​u​n​i​c​e​f​-​m​a​l​awi

 

Man­ag­ing edi­tor for this con­tri­bu­tion: Lau­ra Bisaillon