Sun
Is
Rising
Origin of an angel
This is my tale to tell
So you better listen well
Made of heart broken open
Made of bone split in two
In the space between me and you
I didn’t want to lose
But here I am with nothing in my hand
Even your name is fading away
I didn’t want to burn
But your fire it surrounds me
No matter where I turn
Story of an angel
Taking flight in the night
Feathers fall from wings in the sky
Did the angel fly to the moon
Or to a distant star?
Play the game
Guess how far
Hush little baby don’t cry
Hush little baby don’t cry
Hush little baby don’t cry
Hush little baby don’t cry
Story of an angel
Sword in hand for the win
Coming to the end to begin
Angel comes with the fire
Of the last sunrise
Don’t you look the angel
in the eyes
“I think of the whole project as a kind of offering. My hope is that it is a space where people can come. And stealthily, it really is about grief. Because we move from the sun rising, that first song — and that’s The Fifth Dimension, that’s my mom, those harmonies — everything about that is this splendid invocation of hopefulness. And then we end with the origin of an angel. I thought: that’s what she becomes, that’s what you end up as. But it’s a hard lyric, you know. It’s a sense that something’s been transmogrified, and it’s not going back the other way.”
—Daniel Alexander Jones, in this edition of Constellation Conversations
ALTAREDSTATES is made possible with generous support from the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Theater Project, with lead funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and additional support from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. Additional support provided by the Sundance Institute Theatre Lab.
Produced by CalArts Center for New Performance.
ALTAR NO. 1 is commissioned by The Public Theater, and created with support from CalArts Center for New Performance and New York Live Arts’ Live Feed Residency, with funding from Rockefeller Brothers Fund, National Endowment for the Arts, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, Stavros Niarchos Foundation, and the Partners for New Performance.