Music takes time to impact the eardrums. The Kronos Quartet
(“kronos” being the Greek word for “time”)
has been making its impact across the world for 30 years.
But the culmination of those decades of experience has moved
beyond sonic experimentation and into the realm of visual imagery.
Playing at Royce Hall on Saturday at 8 p.m., Kronos Quartet’s
“Visual Music,” a set of 10 pieces by composers such as
Sigur Ros, Steve Reich, Terry Riley, Bernard Herrmann, Scott
Johnson and John Zorn, infuses theatrical stagings of music with
overarching philosophical musings.
“Hopefully, a sense of the past and the present and maybe
even the future will be a part of this experience,” said
David Harrington, founder of Kronos and violinist for the string
group.
Kronos is UCLA’s second and current artist-in-residence, a
role it is fulfilling through “Visual Music,” which is
having its premiere at Royce.
This is its third appearance at UCLA this academic year: Last
month the group collaborated with the visiting Merce Cunningham
Dance Company and last September they brought their Mexico-inspired
album, “Nuevo,” to life in Royce.
In the “Nuevo” concert, various lighting effects
recalled the Mexican landscape.
With work on film scores such as “Requiem for a
Dream,” Kronos is not new to the idea that visual stimulation
can often help musical digestion.
“The lines between music and visuals and politics and
poetry, hopefully they all merge at “˜Visual
Music,'” Harrington said. “The overriding
experience will be musical, and the visual elements will propel the
musical elements to an even more far-reaching place.”
Harrington’s vision found its way to I.F. Stone, a
progressive anti-war journalist who intrigued Harrington. At
Harrington’s suggestion, composer Scott Johnson sampled a
speech Stone made 20 years ago and fashioned a “Visual
Music” piece around the rhythms and musicalities in it. What
resulted was not just a distinct sound, but also a political
statement.
“When you hear the Stone piece, there’s no question
he’s talking about events, and even though they happened 20
years ago, it sounds like they’re happening today,”
Harrington said.
No doubt war is on the musicians’ minds as they’ve
lined up pieces which ask philosophical questions related to
destruction. Even minimalist Steve Reich’s “Pendulum
Music,” featuring four microphones which swing like pendulums
in front of speakers to cause feedback noise patterns, imitates the
delicate balance of war and peace.
“I find myself thinking about it a lot right now with
what’s going on in world events,” Harrington said.
“It’s the idea that we would activate these pendulums
and then we set in motion these events, and how carefully you have
to think about what you set in motion.”
Similarly, Kronos is doing a segment of Bernard Herrmann’s
theremin-infused score to 1951’s “The Day the Earth
Stood Still.” A classic science fiction film about an alien
who comes to Earth in a flying saucer and warns humanity to make
peace or else face annihilation.
“We thought one of the reasons we wanted to do “˜Day
the Earth Stood Still’ was because of the times we’re
in,” said John Sherba, Kronos’ second violinist.
“It felt like the right thing to do as an individual piece in
these times. This message will interweave with the entire
program.”
To top it off, Kronos is playing a piece by longtime
collaborator and composer Terry Riley. From “Sun
Rings,” Riley’s “One Earth, One People, One
Love,” whose title comes form a post-Sept. 11, 2001 statement
by writer Alice Walker, brings together space sounds generated by a
plasma wave receptor gathered by NASA spacecraft with a message of
hope.
“I think in our music, we do what we consider to be the
ideal world,” Riley said. “Rather than go out and look
for enemies in my music, I’d rather try to harmonize the
atmosphere through music.”
Behind each piece’s philosophical attitudes lies a
different, more liberal way to think of sound. Human speech or
space sounds are not considered music that usually generates any
accompaniment, let alone a full-fledged piece. Screeching feedback
is generally a mistake, not the focus of a piece as in
“Pendulum Music.”
In fact, the string group won’t even be playing strings
for some of the pieces. “Pendulum” uses microphones as
instruments. Violist Hank Dutt gets to solo on the theremin and
piano for “Day the Earth Stood Still.” Everyone gets to
play the Harry Bertoia sound sculptures, long metal rods connected
at the base which are used as instruments via sampler technology
and infrared sensors.
Yet these ideas are staples of Kronos’ work and the reason
for its being. Kronos is still going strong with relatively new
cellist Jennifer Culp added in 1999, and “Visual Music”
is both a look back at the past 30 years and a preview of those to
come.
“What we’re doing is creating a new concert that
uses things we’ve learned from our other
visualizations,” Harrington said. “Definitely,
“˜Visual Music’ is a part of the way we feel about
celebrating 30 years of playing concerts and making musical
experiences.”
For tickets to “Visual Music,” call the Central
Ticket Office at 310-825-2101 or go to www.cto.ucla.edu.
This article contains interviews compiled by Dan (mixtape
maker/Adir Levy admirer) Crossen, Daily Bruin Reporter.