LAURIE ANDERSON Empty Places BROOKLYN ACADEMY of MUSIC Harvey Lichtenstein, President and Executive Producer
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Brooklyn Academy of Music LAURIE ANDERSON Empty Places BROOKLYN ACADEMY OF MUSIC Harvey Lichtenstein, President and Executive Producer presents BAM Opera House October 3-15, 1989 ~[f¥1]~uW ~l~CC~~ A Performance by Laurie Anderson' NEW YORK PREMIERE l"First performed at Spoleto Festival U.S.A., Charleston, South Carolina, June 8, 1989. The creation of this work and performances at Spoleto U'SA, BAM, and UCLA Center for the Performing Arts were made possible, in part, with major support from the LILA WALLACE-READER'S DIGEST FUND. Additional Support for the BAM performances has been provided by THE ANDY WARHOL FOUNDATION FOR THE VISUAL ARTS. Joseph V. Melillo, Director, NEXT WAVE Festival EMYfY PLACES A Performance by Laurie Anderson , Production Manager Rob Brenner Visual Director Perry Hoberman Lighting Designer Richard Nelson Visual Computer Programmer/Operator Fraser Bresnahan Film Editor and Projectionist Victoria Meyer Computer Animation and Laurie Anderson 35mm Photography Additional Photography Fraser Bresnahan 16 mm Cameraman Eddie Marritz Technical Director Gregory Meeh Set Design Consultant George Tsypin Sound Design and Engineering Eric Liljestrand Audio Consultant and Designer Bob Bielecki House Mix Engineer Robin Danar Midi Engineer Miles Green Production Assistant Ramon Diaz Master Carpenter Jerry L. Marshall Executive Producer Linda Goldstein Set Construction Tait Towers, Inc., Lititz, Pennsylvania Empty Places will be performed without intermission Excerpts from the album Strange Angels include perforinances by Scott Johnson, Tom "T-Bone" Wolk, David Lebolt, Robby Kilgore, Gib Wharton, Bakithi Khumalo, Bobby McFerrin, Sue Hadjopoulos, Cyro Baptista, Nana Vasconcelos, and Mark Egan. Strange Angels, produced by Laurie Anderson and Roma Baran (with Mike Thorne, Ian Ritchie, Peter Scherer, Arto Lindsay and Leon Pendarvis), will be released by Warner Brothers Records on October 24, 1989. EMPTY PLACES Growing up in the Midwest left a lot to the imagination. Since there's nothing there but sky. Nowhere to go but up. I spent a lot of time in my fort smoking oak leaf cigarettes and trying to think of situations that could never have existed- extremely complicated scenarios with completely implausible plots and characters. Later I was surprised to find that some of these things had actually happened. As an artist I have always tried to connect these two worlds: the so-called real world and the other world, an alternate world of possibility and chance: a dream world. My current work is an attempt to describe a series ofplaces that make a map ofthese intersections. A map that shows the relationship between electronics and human beings, a map that shows Dodge City, Coolsville, a country armed to the teeth, a country haunted by the future, a place where 6~ percent of the people believe in Heaven. It is "about" these things but ofcourse it is really aboutthe way stories, images, and sounds resonate and clash to form an' irratio~al sense of this space. Geronimo and Little Nancy. Marilyn and John F. dancipg Uncle took the message and it's written on the wall These a'fe pictures of the houses. Shining in the midnight moonlight While the King sings Love Me Tender And all along the watchtowers- and under the big 'western sky We're singin': Yoo hooo! We're singin'wild blue (from Hiawa~ha) Because much ofwhat I do involves electronics and the media (locked in an air-conditioned studio, dark, alone) I myself am an extreme example of the effects of electronics on the human being. I love electronics because it's fascinating and I hate it because of its enormous potential to isolate people from each other. Maybe that's why Iwant to drag electronics outofthe studio and onto a stage. Electronics is not only part ofthe story of this work- it's the control mechanism for the multiple screens, midi instruments, film, video and animation thatmake up whatthis worklooks andsounds like. The visual design of Empty Places is a radical departure for me. The monolithic screen has been replaced by a series of screens that come and go and are capable offracturing images as well as creating instant "sets'~the bottom of a swimming pool, the top of a building. Several ofthe songs and stories from Empty Places have been performed ov~r the last few months in Europe and the United States and several of,the songs will be represented on an album, Strange Angels, to be released by Warner Brot~ers Records in October. Laurie Anderson --------------------- Laurie Anderson, photo Copyright © 1988 The Estate ofRobert Mapplethorpe. LAURIE ANDERSON, one ofthe premiere per into the ears. Although she had given up classi formance artists in America, has consistently cal violin at age sixteen, she began to use violins intrigued, entertained and challenged audiences in intriguing ways. The violin became a prop, with her multi-media presentations. A composer electronically altered to act as a vent(iloquist's and stand-up comic, she blends sounds, short dummy. The first violin she designed was self stories, gags, dreams, slides, films and evocatively playing with a speaker built in. In early street per textured, elusive music. Her artistic career has formances, she played this violin on a blockofice cast her in roles as various as fine artist (sculptor into which her skates had been frozen. The per and painter), composer, poet, photographer, formance was over when the ice melted. filmmaker, electronics whiz, vocalist and She also designed a tape bow violin, with pre instrumentalist. recorded audio tape replacing the horsehair bow. Laurie Anderson grew up in a small town in Where the violin strings would have been were Illinois with four brothers and three sisters. Her playback heads. She used everything from human father is in the house paint business and her voices to animal cries to create a whole repertoire mother trains horses. Laurie Anderson began ofelectronically altered sounds to which she had taking violin lessons at five, and she was enrolled access during a particular piece. Moving the bow in advanced art classes while still a child. in certain ways would create higher or lower Ms. Anderson studied art history at Barnard pitched tones, as well as accelerated or slowed College, and later earned her Master ofFine Arts voices. In this way, the common and everyday degree from Columbia University. While work could be transformed into any kind of "music" ing toward her degree, she taught a night course she wanted. at City College on Egyptian and Assyrian sculp Through the '70s Laurie Anderson gave a num ture. She has also worked as art critic for Art ber ofsolo performances, participated in group forum, Artnews and Art in America. art shows and one-person exhibitions. Mixing In the early '70s, Laurie Anderson expanded poetry, stories and songs in herperformances, she from sculpture to photography and electronic gradually built a reputation as a performance art arts. One of her early projects was a table that ist in the United States and Europe. played music when you leaned your elbow on it In 1980 Ms. Anderson recorded 0 Superman, and held your hands to your ears. Music from a a portion of her then work-in-progress, United concealed tape deek was then conducted through States. It rose to number two on the British pop the wood, through the bones in the listener's arms charts and became a hit in the U.S. The com- pleted United States, a seven-hour, four-part multi-media event had its debut at BAM in 1983. Big Science, an album compiling a number of excerpts from United States came outin 1982 and her album, Mister Heartbreak, came outin 1984. Also in 1984 United States Live, a five record set featuring nearly all the music andspoken mate rial from United States, was released with the companion United States book. In 1986, Laurie Anderson embarked on the Natural History world tour. Jona~han Demme's Swimming to Cambodia, featuring a soundtrack by Ms. Anderson, was released in 1987. Also in 1987 Ms. Anderson and her video "clone" hosted the PBS series, ''Alive From OffCenter;' and she gave a series oflecture/demonstrations at colleges around the country. Laurie Anderson's new album, Strange Angels, will be released by Warner Brothers Records on October 24. BOB BIELECKI (Audio Consultant and Designer) has been working in the audio field for more than twenty years. This work has involved the creative use of sound for concerts, theater, film, radio and records. In addition, he has devel oped elec~ronic designs, special effects, and instruments for ,many artists including Laurie Anderson, LaMonte Young, and Bill Irwin. ROB BRENNER (Production Manger) has worked with Laurie Anderson for the past year., He has toured throughout the world as produc tion manager and lighting director with many artists, among them Mikhail Baryshnikov and Philip Glass. FRASER BRESNAHAN (Visual Computer Programmer/Operator) is a filmmaker/ performer and audio/visual technician. Heprevi ously worked with Laurie Anderson on her film Home of the Brave, her 1986 tour Natural History, and her videotape What You Mean We? He has also toured as projectionist with Philip Glass' 1000 Airplanes on the Roof and done sou.nd for off-Broadway productions. He is cur rently working on a heavy metal musical about the Army-McCarthy hearings. ROBIN DANAR (House Mix Engineer) is a soundengineer/producerworking in NewYork. After spending the last several years touring with such acts as Suzanne Vega, The Church, and others, he is currently in the studio in New York producing The Velvet Rhythm Wranglers. RAMONDIAZ (Production Assistant) is a musi JERRY L. MARSHALL (Master Carpenter) was cian and engineer. He has worked at the on tour last year with the Philip Glass produc Living Room recording studio and The Box tion of1000 Airplanes on the Roof His regional recording studio.