Excerpt
JUDY WOODRUFF (Newshour): Finally tonight: A classical art form meets cutting-edge technology, an opera that will be simulcast, where viewers around the globe can interact with the performance this Sunday.
Jeffrey Brown has the story.
MAN: Wow. They remember their parts.
JEFFREY BROWN (Newshour): In the future there will be robots. But there will also be opera, the power of technology joined to the human imagination.
(SINGING)
JEFFREY BROWN: That, at least, is one message from the opera “Death and the Power” by composer, computer scientist, and futurist Tod Machover.
TOD MACHOVER, “Death and the Power”: A lot of my work has been about humanizing technology and making technology, especially in music, be an extension of human gesture.
JEFFREY BROWN: Machover’s opera tells the story of Simon Powers, a successful businessman seeking immortality through technology by downloading his mind and spirit into a computer program called the System.
Now, stay with us here, because his essence becomes incorporated into physical objects. Robots line up on stage, representing each of the main characters of the show. During the prologue and epilogue, they also serve as a kind of Greek chorus. They’re all that is left on planet Earth. Once every year, they gather to remember and tell the story of Simon Powers, even though they have no real knowledge of human emotion.
They are moved about by iPads and remote controls using cutting-edge software such as a position tracking system and 3-D visualization.
With a libretto by former poet laureate Robert Pinsky, it’s a new twist on old-age life-and-death questions, and newer ones about the role of technology.
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