August 4 1964

A world premiere recording of Stucky's August 4, 1964, a "secular oratorio" commissioned by the Dallas Symphony Orchestra to honor the 100th Anniversary of LBJ's birth. The work centers on a single day in the Johnson Presidency when President Johnson and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara decided to escalate the Vietnam conflict, and when the bodies of 3 slain civil rights workers were discovered in Mississippi. The libretto by Gene Scheer (Jake Heggie's Moby Dick; Tobias Picker's An American Tragedy) juxtaposes White House telephone tapes, letters from the slain civil rights workers and their mothers, speeches by President Johnson, and other contemporary sources. Stucky's music heightens the gripping narrative, which pulses with contemporary relevance.