CATSCAN/DOGMA : creating new music-theatre

This thesis traces the process of creating a music-theatre piece. Initial investigations into solo performance, community theatre and popular political theatre prove to be unworkable and frustrating. The embryonic story begins to emerge from readings into human trafficking in South-east Asia. The research travels from traditional political theatre, through Dada, Surrealism and Brechtian techniques towards a postmodern / post-dramatic approach to theatre that sees boundaries between performative traditions dissolve and hybrid forms come into play. The work of Robert Wilson serves as a model of subversive theatre. Tensions between form and content shape the metamorphosis of the piece. Radical techniques inspire the work although the piece eventually adopts a relatively conventional narrative structure. The postmodern distrust of language and the embrace of a wider definition as to what constitutes politics lead the story into the field of new music-theatre. The composition utilises obsolete technologies to create an electronic soundtrack. Images and a scenario are drawn from research and the subconscious. The blueprint of soundtrack and script offers interpretative scope for director / choreographer / performers and in this sense the creative process is incomplete. The author concludes that in the process of creating the piece, the story dictated its own form. Further exploration would investigate where to perform the piece to achieve maximum political impact.