Once we consider arts establishments as bastions of tradition, thought, and innovation, it’s laborious to provide you with an orchestra doing a greater job than the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Whereas their programming actually doesn’t lack the “classics” that orchestras typically depend on to fill seats, they’ve additionally modeled a extra forward-thinking strategy.
Because of a curious and eccentric LA crowd that’s at all times keen to take a look at one thing new, the Nov. 16 world premiere of Doug Aitken’s Lightscape bought out Walt Disney Live performance Corridor throughout “Midday to Midnight: Area Recordings,” a 12-hour up to date music pageant that includes performances and artwork installations in each nook of the corridor.
Referenced slightly nebulously as an “art work,” Lightscape is an element feature-length movie, half artwork set up, half musical efficiency. The work is each outdated and new, rural and metropolitan, and a myriad of different juxtapositions which can be all linearly related. The music and the imagery transfer by means of time seamlessly, with every second reaching again to tug the following one into its place. Pitches linger till they remodel into a brand new piece; faces ripple into one another whereas searing dissonances fester.
Doug Aitken’s Lightscape — Images of Midday to Midnight and Lightscape supplied courtesy of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Affiliation
The live-to-picture performances by the LA Phil New Music Group and Los Angeles Grasp Chorale (led by conductor Grant Gershon) contributed to this kaleidoscopic push and pull. The musicians had been additionally briefly within the movie, a meta second that reminded us of their presence onstage. The small ensemble melted into the scenes on display screen with their stay efficiency of Aitken’s music created in collaboration with Gershon and the LA Grasp Chorale, however the movie additionally included recorded works by notable minimalists like Philip Glass and Steve Reich. All through the work, the repetition and gradual shifts in rhythm and pitch created a musical labyrinth with as a lot frenzy as the pictures flitting throughout the display screen at lightning velocity.
The starkest distinction was between the huge pure landscapes of the American West and its bustling metropolis streets. Sprawling aerial views of Demise Valley had been adorned with lush string melodies from the recorded works, with the denser instrumentation including bass and buzz at factors of momentum. When the setting switched to a extra trendy metropolis panorama, the on-stage pianists perked up, tapping out punchy, condensed melodies to accompany the gritty scenes.
Pushing us even farther from the desolate outside setting that opened the movie had been scenes set in a warehouse. Simply because the sounds of birdsong and crackling leaves had beforehand turn out to be one with the music, the click and whirring of robotic arms sat atop pulsing and compact membership beats that felt straight out of a futuristic online game.
Doug Aitken’s Lightscape — Images of Midday to Midnight and Lightscape supplied courtesy of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Affiliation
“You may get misplaced within the blink of an eye fixed” is a chorus all through the movie, one of many few phrases spoken in the complete 67-minute runtime. As a musician, I couldn’t assist however join this to the head-spinning, cyclical minimalist patterns that churned on and on, although I’m positive that’s not what they meant. Slightly, the speed of the movie was so nice at instances, it made the moments of serenity that a lot way more grounding.
When the display screen reduce from a chaotic montage of nightlife to a picturesque panorama and ethereal ascending vocals, it introduced the viewers again to a less complicated time, one in all stillness and purity. However by the tip of the movie, these two extremes had been pressured to face one another: a frenetic ostinato constructed as a person in a automobile barreled by means of the desert towards one other man on a horse, with the automobile stopping simply wanting the anticipated collision.
In its multiplicity, Lightscape urges the viewer to interrogate how the passing of time adjustments the world round us. At a second when many could also be struggling to look towards the long run, the work leaves room for interpretation because it sits on the intersection of various types, themes, and creative mediums. For many who couldn’t snag a ticket to the premiere, Lightscape will probably be showcased as a large-scale artwork set up on the Marciano Artwork Basis from Dec. 17, 2024 – Mar. 15, 2025.
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