The Astronaut’s Tale

Composer Charles Fussell was Artistic Director of New Music Harvest, Boston's first city-wide festival of contemporary music and Co-Founder and Director of the New England Composer's Orchestra. He is currently a member of the Composition faculty at Boston University. The composer writes: "The Astronaut's Tale was mostly written during a generous two month fellowship at Yadoo in Saratoga Springs in June and July of 1996, and was completed the following winter. It is conceived as a numbers-opera; arias, duets, trios, with preludes and interludes, all connected by a narrator. The story traces a young man's life from his first experience of loss, his dog killed by a car, the appearance of a mysterious Einstein-like guide, his youthful desire to become an astronaut, marriage, and the fulfillment of his ambition. The setting is our own time with its confrontation of science and religion. The opera concludes with a meditation on the nature of the cosmos and our experience of life and death within."