DavidByrne.com - The Knee Plays - Reviews

THE KNEE PLAYS: REVIEWS [Link to full text]

"Gospel oomph with a keening saxophone (Matt Darriau); the splintered, icy chords of “Winter,” morphing into a tolling like that of bells; an intended homage to the Italian film composer Nino Rota in “Admiral Perry” (“I missed by a long shot,” Mr. Byrne said), with a sleepy melody from muted trumpets supported by a bass beat."
The New York Times, 2.3.07

"The 13 vignettes that comprise 'The Knee Plays' are meant to be joints or connectives between the long acts of 'Civil Wars.' Extracted from the cycle and put together into an evening lasting 100 minutes, the 'opera' is not simply a series of interludes. Instead, it is like an acrostic puzzle, a riddle that, once solved, assumes a new shape and significance."
The New York Times, 12.4.86

"These stately Dixieland marches contrasted almost bizarrely with the stylized Japanese choreography. That's why Byrne liked them. "I thought something repetitive but funky would be one of the least expected sounds to place against those slow-moving visual tableaux." Wilson didn't mind -- the only instructions he gave about the score were that the musicians had to get on and off the stage quickly and that they had to play loud enough to disguise the clump-clump of set changes. Such are the pleasures of working with a structuralist director."
Boston Phoenix, 1986

"…as The Knee Plays progress, lyrical, even casual jazzy tunes gradually dissolve in more constrained, in times obsessive patterns…"
The Tech, MIT, 9.26.86

"Mr. Byrne's score sounds nothing like the music of his rock band, Talking Heads, or his music for Twyla Tharp's 'Catherine Wheel' on Broadway. It was inspired by the solemn and jaunty sounds of New Orleans brass bands, and played live with great skill by seven Minnesota musicians."
The New York Times, 4.29.84