What is the point of music? Is it to move listeners or to wake them up? To be beautiful or brutal? Turf battles over these questions roiled the musical landscape of the past century, leaving it pockmarked with ruptures and revolutions. But what once was bold now sounds quaint. Few sonic tricks are left to raise an eyebrow. So what is there for an avant-garde composer to do? For Peter Els, a retired 70-year-old loner in rural Pennsylvania, and the anti-hero of Richard Powers's 11th novel, "Orfeo", the answer lies in microbiology. His plan is to inscribe music into the genetic material of bacterium, to ensure it lasts "for forever and for no one". This idea is odd, but perhaps it is also a fitting coda to a lifetime spent creating jagged, alienating and often-ignored compositions. Regardless, Els's do-it-yourself genetic engineering falls foul of America's Homeland Security. Labelled "Bioterrorist Bach" by the shrill, fear-mongering media, a panicked Els hits the road and becomes a fugitive.
展开▼
