For four evenings—April 17, 19, 21, 23, 1991 at The Kitchen, composer/performer Diamanda Galas performed excerpts from Plague Mass, her ongoing series of musical works dealing with the AIDS epidemic.

 

In this solo concert presentation, Galas performed pieces from several albums of the Plague Mass cycle: The Divine Punishment, Saint of the Pit, and You Must Be Certain of the Devil, among others. Galas’s lyrics combined biblical passages, traditional spirituals, and 19th century poetry with her own writing and were delivered with her operatic, genre-re-defining vocals. 

 

Structured as a demonic paraphrase of traditional mass, with dramatic lighting designed by Dan Kotlowitz, Galas’s performance unleashed her rage at a homophobic, misogynistic fundamentalism that treats people with AIDS as disposable, societal outcasts.