Elements of Style

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The imaginative piece The Elements of Style is based on Strunk & White’s book of the same name. Composer Nico Muhly collaborated with illustrator and designer Maira Kalman to create the work, which premiered at the New York Public Library in October 2005. The operatic song cycle was written for soprano, tenor, viola, banjo, percussion, and typewriter, eggbeater, duck call, assorted bells, clattering cup and saucer, CANunDRUM, cherry-pitter, meat-grinder, whistle, loud books, and other humdrum but beloved objects.

“His Strunk and White songs are eloquently scored…The Vocal writing is cast in a distinctly early-music style, the textures as pure and pared down as Strunk and White liked their sentences. There are frequent moments of disarming beauty, as if Mr. Muhly were tempting the listener to forget jokes and simply listen.”
~ Jeremy Echler, The New York Times