“Brooklyn-based composer Missy Mazzoli follows her 2012 release Song from the Uproar: The Lives and Deaths of Isabelle Eberhardt with the equally stellar Vespers for a New Dark Age. Over two years in the making, the classical-electronic-vocal epic dazzles on sonic grounds, brought to life as it is by the all-female ensemble Victoire and drummer Glenn Kotche. Also arresting on conceptual grounds, the work clothes the traditional vespers (from the Latin, the word means “evening”) prayer service in modern garb by replacing the standard sacred verses with poems by Matthew Zapruder. In doing so, Mazzoli’s work questions what role the supernatural plays in a technology-dominated culture and explores what haunts us in this “New Dark Age” we so very definitely find ourselves in.”
Online Version