On Thursday September 29th Classicist-musician Joe Goodkin performed his original musical composition of the Homeric masterpiece, the Odyssey. During the event, hosted by Professor of Classics Roger Travis, Joe played his 30-minute continuous piece that deconstructs the story of the Odyssey in song.

 

Goodkin put together a solo acoustic guitar and voice recital made of 24 original songs, whose lyrics are inspired by the epic book. His music is a fusion of mellow melodies, open-beat tunes and blues rhythms. He studied Ancient Greek at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and decided to combine his passion for the classics with his musical expertise after having written and recorded his own rock music. He has received several ASCAP Composers’ awards.

 

His UConn concert captivated the audience and following his performance, Professor Travis briefly spoke about the relevance of the Odyssey within the context of modern digital media. During the discussion, students asked Goodkin about his thoughts on the Homeric story as well as his musical background. Goodkin explained that each of his songs are an interpretation of the Odyssey and represent the personal perspectives of its main characters. He added that his songs pay tribute to the characters’ universal human dimension by recreating their feelings and experiences. Although he admitted that a lot of narrative inevitably gets lost when the book is turned into a series of songs, he said that his lyrics attempts to capture the emotional charge of the experience of hearing the epic poem as it was originally performed.

 

Since 2003 Goodkin has been on a tour at high schools and colleges across the US and Canada, and his UConn’s recital marked his 200th performance. His songs are available for purchase on iTunes and Spotify.

 

For more information, go to his website, www.joesodyssey.com

 

Adriana Alcina Gómez

---