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| One of the most important playwrights in America…” Romanian TV, 2005
“Ruth Margraff is a performance artist who looks like Shirley Temple, sounds like Marilyn Monroe and has the mentality of Thomas Merton eating alive William S. Burroughs. She’s got a savage imagination and a very sweet affect.” ~Erik Ehn National Public Radio “All Things Considered”: “From the enchanting lilt of librettist Ruth Margraff’s voice…the gorgeously poetic dialogue with which Margraff has endowed her libretto, the intoxicating Balkan rhythms composer Nikos Brisco has laced through his score for a feisty gypsy band, and the historic subject matter complete with warring factions, bloodthirsty brothers, and dangerous seduction, it seems that…the duo may have a little masterpiece on their hands.” ~Arts Cure Magazine on CAFÉ ANTARSIA at Culturemart/Here Arts Center Jan. 14, 2005 “Ruth Margraff is a vital voice in shaping the future of American theatre… a warrior writer riding the vanguard of New Wave opera, pushing the boundaries of the stage. To the prosaic ears of an American, Margraff's language might sound like music. It works on you like a song, the way a song can take you from one emotion to another between one note and the next. It works on you like a dream...She travels everywhere, like an electrifying idea. ~Austin American Statesman~2004 “An album length play... hypnotic...brutal...a baptism of fire.” ~The Austin Chronicle~2001 “Enough frissons for a full novel written in verse...potently hewn piece of rural American mythology.” “Brilliantly performed...layer after layer of richly textured emotion...imminent danger...with precision of cadence and inflection.” “Margraff stretches the bounds of opera” ~Providence Journal~2001 “Audaciously original...the new Bob Dylan” "This is cabaret theater as damnation tongue in chic...with everything from breathy love songs to darkly urgent ballads with a Balkan flavor." “Greek yet inescapably modern sound” ~ Talkin Broadway.com~ Sept 17, 2004 “Composer Brisco has written a melodic score full of gypsy influences…Special mention must go to Orpheus’ four-piece band: guitarists Brisco and Ron Riley, percussionist Rami El-Aasser, and accordion player Ruth Margraff all perform beautifully.” ~ New York Theater.com~ Sept. 18, 2004 “A mix of Balkan, Greek, Texan and rock sounds. These faintly exotic melodies make for a most unusual soundscape. As befits the underworld, the songs are lamentations, full of keening and pain.” “A special nod goes to the band, whose mix of Greek, Balkan, and rock sounds lend the piece the rock-epic feel, and the Sirens whose harmonies are as sweet as the juice of a pomegranate.” |
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