Julie, Gabriella and I walked the lovely Presidio loop trail this morning. On our journey we found a box that contained adventure maps of the area, walked through enchanting, delicious smelling groves of eucalyptus trees, traveled past gorgeous flowers of all kinds, saw multiple beautiful views of the Golden Gate Bridge, explored a little of the SF National Cemetery, walked barefoot on the beach (the cold ocean water and warm sand helped revive our tired feet) and marveled at a pack of unicyclists riding down 25th Avenue and smoothly turning onto El Camino Del Mar. WOW-that was impressive!
We stopped where I am house sitting to have coffee and hang out with Otis, who was very excited to see us! He’s completely in love with Gabriella and happily snuggled in next to her, after stealing Julie’s socks! It was nice to take a break from walking and catch up without worrying about bikes or runners coming up behind us- walking in San Francisco on a weekend can be a dangerous sport. 😉
Tonight I checked out a place I have been wanting to see for a while, Audium. I experienced a work called Swells by Ven Voisey who spent a month making recordings from Audium’s building and surrounding neighborhood, then created a musical piece from different sounds such as creaking chairs, the hum of the breaker box, hinges, water pipes, traffic and his own voice.
In the lobby, there were tall wooden towers with horn speakers on top that emitted different and voices, it was both spooky and compelling.
The show was held in Audium’s circular theater reached by walking down a dark, twisting hallway. Attendees are seated in chairs in concentric circles in a room that has 176 speakers! The lights are dimmed until it is completely black (except for light arrows on the floor in case someone has to leave during the show.) The show began with strange, tapping noises, humming and other vocals. Later there were traffic noises, voices and many other sounds I couldn’t identify. In keeping with the title of the piece, Swells, the sound would rise up and become very loud and chaotic then calm down and shift back-and-forth. It was fascinating, and I felt most connected when the piece was loudest and busiest, because it focused all of my attention on the sound surrounding me. It’s a live performance, so the composer was in the theater creating the sound from the many, many recordings he made over the last month. We got to meet him after the show and hear a little bit about how he created the piece and worked with the instrument that is the Audium sound ‘system’. What an amazing experience- I would definitely go back and check out another show at Audium in the future.
