On May 20, 1962, the morning after his first child is born, Benjamin Patterson writes a touching birth announcement to his own parents. The letter covers all the usual details—the baby’s weight and height, how the birth went, what the hospital is like—but its form is totally unique. Most of the letter is written in the voice of his newborn son, Ennis. Patterson, then a young, struggling musician and composer living as an American expat in Paris, shows off his creativity and experimental writing in this letter. He has been honing these skills making unusual musical scores for instruments, for paper, for bodies moving through a city.
In addition to marking a personal milestone, this moment coincides with a turning point in his career: four months after his son’s birth, Patterson will help launch the first festival of Fluxus, a loose collective of avant-garde artists. And shortly after that, he will move back to the US as he tries to find ways to support his family as an artist.
In this episode of Recording Artists: Intimate Addresses, you’ll trace Patterson’s move from classical bassist to Fluxus composer, and from his retirement from art at the height of his career to his return to music 20 years later. Host Tess Taylor unpacks the challenges Patterson faced as an artist, a father (the only parent featured this season), and a Black man in a largely white art world. Anna Deavere Smith reads the letter. Art historian julia elizabeth neal and musicologist, composer, and historian George Lewis contextualize the work, unusual career trajectory, and importance of this understudied artist.
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