Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.In this intriguing alliance of soul and classical forms, David McAlmont uses selections from Nyman's back catalogue as the backdrops to song-stories drawn from recent news reports, all concerning people on the cusp of crisis.
In the title-track, for instance, an unnamed talent-show contestant (clearly Susan Boyle) comes to terms with the sudden searing blast of fame, and in "Take the Money and Run", the chattering piano, sawing violins and aspirational horns of Nyman's Seville Fanfare furnish suitably urgent accompaniment to McAlmont's account of the couple who, finding their account mistakenly credited with £10 million, understandably did a runner. Many songs deal with the poor and dispossessed – the jailed drug mule of "In Laos", the Zimbabwean child refugees in "Fever Sticks and Bones", the trafficked humans stranded in the "City of Turin" – on whose stories Nyman's minimalist riffs impose an air of fatalistic inevitability. Concluding proceedings is the Nyman Sax Quartet's 17-minute suite "Songs For Tony", whose industriously tootling reeds offer the missing link between Henry Purcell and Moondog.
Download this Take the Money and Run; City of Turin; The Glare; Songs for Tony
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments