e-gtr.cl.e-vln.e-vcl.drumset.vib.synth
Abkürzungsverzeichnis (PDF)
Boosey & Hawkes (Hendon Music)
Electric Proletariat is an amplified version of my 2002 work hope in the proles., created for my then-new ensemble Newspeak in 2004. The work was inspired by the writings of George Orwell, in particular the following passage from NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR in which Orwell laments the proletariat, large in numbers, but often unable to organize.
"If there was hope, it must lie in the proles, because only there, in those swarming disregarded masses, eighty-five percent of the population…could the force to destroy the Party ever be generated. …the proles, if only they could somehow become conscious of their own strength, would have no need to conspire. They needed only to rise up and shake themselves like a horse shaking off flies. If they chose they could blow the Party to pieces tomorrow morning."
Lasting approximately sixteen minutes, and scored for clarinet, synthesizer, drumset, percussion, violin, cello, and electric guitar, Electric Proletariat is divided into seven movements, performed without pause:
I. prologue: seeing. -
II. prolesong. -
III. assimilation. -
IV. interlude: understanding. -
V. brutality. -
VI. hope. -
VII. epilogue: defying.
It was first performed by Newspeak on October 25, 2005.
—David T. Little,
February 3, 2020