FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 26, 2016, 11:00 a.m. CDT
Contact Jason Hogue, Peru State College Marketing and Communications, 402.872.2429
Peru, Nebraska- Peru State College Assistant Professor of English Jeff Alessandrelli’s vinyl-record
only poetry press, Fonograf Editions, is the only press of its kind in the United
States. The press’s first album, “Aloha/irish trees,” by Eileen Myles has garnered
two national reviews in Nylon Magazine and DIAGRAM.
Myles is the inspiration for the character of Leslie Mackinaw on the Emmy-award Amazon
Prime television show “Transparent” and her career-spanning poetry collection “I Must
Be Living Twice: New and Selected Poems 1975-2014” received universally strong reviews
upon its publication by Harper Collins.
Nylon Magazine writes of the record, “If one were going to make a vinyl of poetry
in the digital era, Myles is the ideal choice for such a project. Her poems lend themselves
perfectly to being read out loud.”
“Besides for coming up through spoken word poetry and the St. Mark’s poetry project,
her thick Boston accents relishes the words, making them juicy and tart with the kind
of addictive rhythm that gets the lines stuck in your head so you want to listen to
the poems again. The various sounds of the record—the squishing of her spit, the breathing
punctuating the poems, the swallows, the mistakes, the repetitions, the occasional
sniffs, and slurring—make it more like music than poetry.”
DIAGRAM’s review highlights the medium as well, “Listening to Myles' Aloha/Irish Trees, you are consenting to both the whims of vinyl's largely uninterrupted contiguity
and the integral tenacity of the reading. This makes for an altogether different experience
than reading.”
Fonograf Editions next record, due in November, will be “Conflation” by Rae Armantrout.
Armantrout’s book, “Versed” won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry.
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For more information, visit www.peru.edu or call 1-800-742-4412.
About Peru State College: Nestled in the historic hills of the Missouri River, the
“Campus of a Thousand Oaks" is Nebraska’s oldest college and will celebrate its sesquicentennial
anniversary in 2017. Peru State College’s constant commitment to academic excellence
has resulted in a unique and innovative mix of online, traditional, undergraduate
and graduate programs. Similarly, the college's ongoing student engagement promotes
inquiry, discovery and innovation on-campus and across the region. Peru State College
is committed to being a good steward of education, students, the region and Nebraska
for another 150 years.