Spare Parts Op.36 

SATB a cappella 8'

Text: Tim Rose-Price

Commission by the King's Singers 
First performed Queen Elizabeth Hall London / 1977

Originally scored for 6 male voices 2 Counter-Tenors / Tenor / 2 Baritones / Bass

 

This is another witty collaboration with the writer Tim Rose-Price. Patterson and Rose-Price first worked together on the now legionary “Time Piece”

‘Spare Parts’ is set firmly in the Frankenstein tradition. A megalomaniac professor takes on the role of God and tries to improve on nature by creating a new man. What the mad, Transylvanian prof. actually achieves is a series of monstrous mistakes.

1.  A Sex-Symbol, who is gradually revealed as an appalling inflatable doll.
2. A  Rock Star, who develops into a chaotic Super Market man, made of ingredients from all over the world.
3.  And finally, the ‘real’ monster, a miserable motley of ‘spare parts’ made of everybody else’s junk, who has no identity of own.

So, the would-be-creator in his attempt to play God has only made monstrous generalizations and reduced mankind lower and lower, until he produces a monster who, quite understandably, turns nasty…..

 

 

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