Taylor Mac is known for being a lot of things: performance artist, playwright, director, producer, and songwriter. He’s also a MacArthur “Genius” fellow.
But Mac is perhaps best known for his epic, 24-hour concert, called A 24-Decade History of Popular Music, which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 2017.
In the show, Mac performs 246 songs that were popular in the United States from 1776–2016 in order to illustrate aspects of American history. And there are numerous participatory elements for the audience to engage in along the way.
Mac will speak during the annual Mitchell Artist Lecture at the University of Houston’s Moores Opera House tonight at 6.
In the audio above, he tells Houston Matters producer Michael Hagerty why he decided to pursue such a project and focus on popular music versus, say, classical.
