favorite intermissions

This is just fascinating, and I’m ashamed that I’ve only just discovered this! “This” is a CD of composer and “sound artist” Christopher DeLaurenti which consists of surreptitiously recorded audio tracks from intermissions of orchestral concerts around the U.S.

What DeLaurenti captures is a mix of audience conversations, stage crews moving equipment and chairs, and random on stage musicians warming up or practicing various musical passages. It’s really quite an interesting and (to me) enthralling concept, to think of the space between the musical presentations having a rhythm and music of its own.

Here’s a link to an article from the New York Times (May 2007) which also includes several samples of tracks from the CD.

As Daniel J. Wakin notes in the Times article:

The recordings at first may have all the allure of watching moss grow. But when the tracks on Mr. DeLaurenti’s CD are heard together, with his theories and the history of the musical avant-garde in the background, they make a crazy kind of sense as performances.

Take a listen, it’ll turn your world a bit on end. If you’re a bit mystified a first, read this accompanying essay to the album.

If you’re in the Seattle area and looking for something to do tonight (Saturday), he’s appearing at the Good Shepherd Center at 8p.m.