Acts of Beauty • Exit no Exit

Infobox Album
Name = Acts of Beauty • Exit no Exit
Type = studio
Longtype =
Artist = Michael Nyman


Cover size = 200
Caption = photograph by Michael Nyman
design by Russell Mills and Michael Webster
Released = July 21, 2006 (UK)
May 27, 2008 (USA)
Recorded = 2004 (Acts of Beauty)
Genre = art song, contemporary classical, chamber music, minimalism
Length =
Language = Italian
English
Label = MN Records
Director =
Producer = Michael Nyman
Reviews = The Guardian Rating|3|5 [http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2006/jul/28/classicalmusicandopera.shopping]
The Independent Rating|4|5 [http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_/ai_n16762956]
Sequenza 21 (mixed) [http://www.sequenza21.com/index.php/850]
Compiler =
Chronology =
Last album = Six Celan Songs • The Ballad of Kastriot Rexhepi
2006
This album = Acts of Beauty • Exit no Exit
2006
Next album = Nyman Brass
2006
Misc =

"Acts of Beauty • Exit no Exit" is the 55th album by Michael Nyman, the eighth on his own label, and the third of these to consist entirely of previously unrecorded work. He does not perform on the album, but composed and produced it. "Acts of Beauty" is a song cycle with texts by various writers commenting on the nature of art and beauty. It is performed by Cristina Zavalloni and Sentieri Selvaggi, conducted by Carlo Boccadoro. "Exit no Exit" was origianlly a vocal work for John Motson called "Beckham Crosses, Nyman Scores", in tribute to the English association football team. Here, the vocal part is rewritten for bass clarinet, and played by Andrew Sparling of the Michael Nyman Band with the Nyman Quartet: Gabrielle Lester, Catherine Thompson, Kate Musker, and Tony Hinnigan.

Acts of Beauty

"Acts of Beauty" features settings of material by Vincenzo Cartari, Kurt Schwitters, subject of Nyman's opera, "", and Dziga Vertov, director of "Man with a Movie Camera", a film he scored at the behest of the British Film Institute.

Track listing

#Due figliuole di un contadino 8:42
#Halt, we are specialists 6:02
#We are at a film studio 6:24
#Life's chaos 3:21
#Marulla's hobby 1:41
#Exit No Exit 1 1:02
#Exit No Exit 2 1:10
#Exit No Exit 3 1:40
#Exit No Exit 4 1:34
#Exit No Exit 5 1:24
#Exit No Exit 6 2:07
#Exit No Exit 7 1:17
#Exit No Exit 8 1:28
#Exit No Exit 9 1:29
#Exit No Exit 10 10:35
#Exit No Exit 11 1:02

External links

* [http://www.mnrecords.com/product.html?cd=MNRCD109 MN Records official site]