UCLA's Herb Alpert School of Music showcases the West Coast debut of 'Synaesthesia Playground' on stage
Get ready for an extraordinary musical event that promises to blur the lines between performance, musicology, theory, and composition. The Synaesthesia Playground is an immersive, interactive classical concert experience, set to have its West Coast premiere on March 2 at UCLA's Schoenberg Hall.
This innovative event, conceived by Jocelyn Ho, an assistant professor at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music and a Young Steinway Artist, brings together an internationally acclaimed team of musicians, computer scientists, visual artists, and fashion designers.
The artistic collaboration features six newly commissioned multimedia works for piano, resulting in a mesmerizing, one-of-a-kind experience. Composers such as Daniel Weymouth, Sidney Boquiren, Andrew Batt-Rawden, Anne Sophie Andersen, and Celeste Oram, along with computer scientist Roy Shilkrot, have collaborated to create this groundbreaking production.
The performance is proudly sponsored by HUL ARNOLD SpectrumNYC and the office of the vice president for research at Stony Brook University.
Jocelyn Ho's debut recital at UCLA is a significant event for the performance studies area in the school of music, according to Neal Stulberg, professor of orchestral studies and music department chair.
The design elements of their composition highlight the contrast between the external nature of the sound of the piano and the visceral, biodynamic responses relayed by the performer playing it. For instance, fashion designers Hul and Arnold have collaborated to create bio-responsive attire for the performer, where optical fibers pulsate and change color in tandem with the performer's heartbeat, breathing, and movements.
Multimedia artist Takafumi Ide and composer and multimedia artist Celeste Oram have created video projections onto the body of the piano, reimagining the instrument as a living organism with a "skin". Visual artists Nagasawa and Ide are also part of this creative endeavour.
Audience participants will become de facto musical instruments, using their smartphones to gamify the music and interact with the pianist on stage, as well as with one another.
The performance is part of the school's chambermusic@ucla program, made possible by the David and Irmgard Dobrow Fund, and is part of the 2016-17 Dobrow Series. A short post-concert talk with Jocelyn Ho and Nina Eidsheim (author of "Sensing Sound: Singing and Listening as Vibrational Practice") immediately follows the performance.
Tickets for the March 2 performance at Schoenberg Hall can be purchased at the door, by calling the UCLA Central Ticket Office, or online. Don't miss out on this unique opportunity to experience music in a whole new light!
Technology and entertainment merge in the Synaesthesia Playground performance, as audience participants use their smartphones to gamify the music and interact with the pianist and fellow attendees, creating an immersive and interactive experience. The fusion of music, computer science, visual arts, and fashion design results in a groundbreaking production that reimagines the piano as a living organism, technologically enhancing it to respond to the performer's heartbeat, breathing, and movements.
