Big Talk
Item
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Score title
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Big Talk
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Composer
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Shelley Washington
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Program note
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BIG Talk was written for two baritone saxophones as a personal response to the repulsive prevalence of rape culture that can be observed in catcalling and sexual harassment that female-identifying persons experience and endure on a daily basis. Many women experience these situations enough to psychologically alter their self-perception and their perception of others in a long-lasting negative way: fear, anger, depression- emotions that seep deeper into the self and permeate deeper into society.
This unrelenting, churning duo is written to be somewhat of an endurance piece that incorporates all aspects of the body- the muscular ability to play the piece, the wind to power the horn, the focus to see it through... I carefully considered the everyday endurance of a constant barrage of physical and verbal abuse, how we as women bear the brunt of the cultural burden, how we are expected to silently maintain physical and emotional poise to align with many "social graces" and how sick of it I am. How sick of it we are. The piece, the poetry, and the visual components are all linked to send a very clear and targeted message: stop perpetuating rape culture by any and every means necessary.
Shelley Washington