The Cult of Pythagoras
a podcast opera in four episodes
WORK IN PROGRESS
A subway passenger records a mysterious guitar player who sings about a lethal number. Her song grows into an opera about the cult of Pythagoras, who razed a city to the ground, murdered his beloved student, and forbade his followers to eat beans.
Demo samples
Episode One: Unity
Pythagoras was an ancient Greek philosopher. He also was a charismatic cult leader, who razed a city to the ground, betrayed his most beloved student, and forbade his followers to eat beans. This is Pythagoras: an incredible story about music, mystics, math, and maniacs. It all begins with love of wisdom, and in the end everyone dies.
E1S5 Beans
E1S9 Musical Intervals
Episode Two: Opinion
There’s a crack in the rational universe, putting Pythagoras at odds with his friend Hippasos. Meanwhile, hundreds of refugees from rival city Sybaris arrive in Croton. The people look to Pythagoras for guidance.
E2S0 Sybaris (teaser)
E2S4 Gongs
Pythagoras, a podcast opera
Pythagoras is a podcast opera about the love of wisdom and speaking truth to power, involving music, mystics, math, and maniacs – and in the end everyone dies. It is an opera, with arias, ensemble pieces, an overture and even a few (invisible) dances; but also a podcast, with a narrator as host asking poignant questions, summarizing scenes, and explaining things like the math of musical intervals. In four half-hour episodes, the podcast popularizes science and innovates opera in a story that resonates today and connects with wide and varied audiences.
The story tells how Pythagoras tragically favors his power over truth. Hailed as a god by his cult-like followers, he preaches that the universe is rational and built in harmonious proportions. Yet, by applying the Pythagorean Theorem, his student finds irrational numbers, jeopardizing this theory and signing his death warrant. Meanwhile, social tensions rise to explosive levels.
The opera is about speaking truth to power in a restless society, unsure about democracy and looking for a leader. These themes resonate today as much as they did 2,500 years ago.
The podcast opera works both as a radio play and as a live performance, staged or in concert.
Credits
Music: Ruben Naeff
Libretto: Joep Stapel
Conductor: David Bloom
Hippasos: Megan Schubert
Pheme / Cylon: Mellissa Hughes
Narrator / Milo: Jeffrey Gavett
Pythagoras: Dashon Burton
All singers double as members of the chorus.
Flutes: Kelli Kathman
Clarinets 1+2: Ken Thomson
French Horn: David Byrd-Marrow
Percussion: Amy Garapic
Acoustic guitar: Taylor Levine
Piano: David Friend
Violin: Pauline Kim-Harris
Double bass: Pat Swoboda
Recording: Jascha Narveson
Sound effects: Ed RosenBerg III
Music engraving: Derek Johnson
Artwork by Sarah Jonker
Ruben Naeff
Joep Stapel
About the authors
Praised as “quick, quirky, and rambunctious,” Ruben Naeff is a Dutch composer living in Brooklyn, New York. His varied background in mathematics and music led to surprising collaborations, such as De Bètacanon, a musical canon about science, written for national newspaper De Volkskrant. Ruben studied with Michael Gordon and Daan Manneke, and holds degrees in math and music from NYU and the University of Amsterdam. His music has been performed across the US, Europe, Asia and Australia. rubennaeff.com
Joep Stapel is a Dutch writer and music journalist. He is a classical and new music critic for national newspaper NRC Handelsblad. He has published a novel (Kaf, Meulenhoff 2019), stories, poetry, and essays. He is also active as a translator of poetry from Italian and English, in collaboration with Jur Koksma. Their anthology of Brooklyn poet Delmore Schwartz was published November 2020. joepstapel.nl
Learn more
Feel free to drop us a line if you’d like to learn more about the project.