“Novelty, Pattern, and Force in Richard Powers’s Orfeo,” Kathryn Hume, Orbit: A Journal of American Literature. 5(1). January 18, 2017.  Richard Powers’s Orfeo pits novelty against familiar pattern, and explores the destructive effects of forcing something new to fit known patterns in art, science, and politics. The protagonist’s dedication to writing truly new music wrecks his, Read More

“Professors at America’s elite colleges pick one book every student should read in 2017,” Business Insider, Abby Jackson, December 22, 2016. James Berger of Yale University picks Orfeo. “It is a story of music and genetics in our contemporary age of terror and surveillance. An idiosyncratic retelling of the Orpheus myth, an elderly avant garde composer who, Read More

“Words and Music: A Conversation about Project Orfeo,” video of a discussion with Richard Powers, violist Jonathan Bagg, and composer Scott Lindroth about collaborations between musicians and writers, and these artists’ experience with their current collaboration for “Project Orfeo.” “Project Orfeo” is a mixed-media concert that combines readings by Powers from his 2014 novel, Orfeo,, Read More

Words and Music: A Conversation about “Project Orfeo,” casual discussion with Richard Powers, Jonathan Bagg, and Scott Lindroth, 12 noon, September 23, Duke University.

Host Frank Stasio speaks with musician Jonathan Bagg and composer Scott Lindroth about the literary inspiration behind Project Orfeo, on “The State of Things,” WUNC, September 21, 2016. Musician Jonathan Bagg, of Duke’s Ciompi String Quartet, enjoys putting on performances that combine the intellectual power of words with the emotional nuance of music. His, Read More

“A Famous Novelist and a Duke Composer Combine Their Powers in Project Orfeo,” by Dan Ruccia, IndyWeek, September 21, 2016. An interview with composer Scott Lindroth about Project Orfeo, based on the Powers novel. “Lindroth’s raving about the book to musicians Jonathan Bagg and Laura Gilbert led Gilbert to reveal that she had grown up with, Read More

“Polyphony beyond the Human: Animals, Music, and Community in Coetzee and Powers,” by Ben de Bruyn, Studies in the Novel, Volume 48, Number 3, Fall 2016 (pp. 364-383). Taking issue with the anthropocentric assumptions behind classic and recent work on sound in the novel, this paper draws attention to animal vocalizations in the writings, Read More

“Music as a Muse: Making Project Orfeo,” by Eric Ferreri, Duke Today, September 20, 2016. “Duke composer Scott Lindroth explains how he turned author Richard Powers’ words into music.” Includes a printed interview and video (also available on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiiJtpnHUQk).

Project Orfeo will be performed at Duke University on September 25, 2016. Powers joins Duke faculty composer Scott Lindroth, the Horszowski Piano Trio, clarinetist Benjamin Fingland, flutist Laura Gilbert and Duke faculty violist Jonathan Bagg in a mixed-media concert that combines readings from Powers’ 2014 novel Orfeo with performances of Messiaen’s Quartet for the End, Read More

“Cadences,” a sextet composed by Scott Lindroth, inspired by the Richard Powers novel Orfeo, was performed in the Electric Earth series at the Avaloch Farm Music Institute in New Hampshire on August 27, 2016.  Lindroth gives opening remarks and Powers reads from Orfeo.  The performance is available on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGIqcJi0fRw.

“Richard Powers provides literary strand for Electric Earth concert,” by David Weininger, Boston Globe, August 25, 2016. Weininger interviews Powers about the “Project Orfeo” concerts. Link to information on the scheduled performances of “Project Orfeo.”

Project Orfeo is a a concert, inspired by Powers’ novel Orfeo, that combines the music of Olivier Messiaen and composer Scott Lindroth. It will be performed on August 27, 2016, at Bass Hall in Peterborough, New Hampshire.  (Link to Peterborough performance) A second performance will be at the Baldwin Auditorim at Duke University on September, Read More