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  • Michael Nyman

  • A Child's View of Colour (2003)

  • Chester Music Ltd (World)

Commissioned by the Young People's Chorous of New York City for 'Transient Glory, the Voices of Children', Francisco J. Núñez, artisitic director.

  • 2vn.va.vc.db
  • children's voices
  • 8 min
  • Walter Benjamin, trans Rodney Livingstone
  • English

Programme Note

My text is extracted from Rodney Livingstone's translation of a short essay by the German cultural historian Walter Benjamin (1892-1940). It was written between 1914-15 during a metaphysical phase before Benjamin embraced Marxism. This text emphasises the young person's, as opposed to the adult's, approach to colour: "for the person who sees with a child's eyes, it marks boundaries, it is not a layer of something superimposed on matter, as it is with adults". This work continues my interest in art-based texts - from "The Kiss" (1985) to my opera "Facing Goya" (2000/02).

© Michael Nyman 2003

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