This worldwide event will happen in Carson City on Sunday, Dec. 22 at 5:30 p.m.
For the first time, the Brewery Arts Center has organized Carson City’s Unsilent Night. Unsilent Night is an original composition by Phil Kline, written specifically to be heard outdoors in the month of December. It takes the form of a street promenade in which the audience becomes the performer. Each participant gets one of four tracks of music in the form of a downloadable Mp3 and played together all four tracks comprise Unsilent Night. The fact that the participants play different “parts” simultaneously helps create the special sound of the piece. Participants carry speakers or anything that amplifies music, and simultaneously start playing the music. They then walk a carefully chosen route through their city’s streets, creating a unique mobile sound sculpture which is different from every listener’s perspective. Carson City’s path will take participants from the Brewery Arts Center up King Street, to Robinson via Mountain Street through the Capital Grounds and back to the BAC in a 45 minute walk.
It all started in winter 1992, when Phil had an idea for a public artwork in the form of a holiday caroling party. He composed a multi-track electronic piece that was 45 minutes long (the length of one side of a cassette tape), invited a few dozen friends who gathered in Greenwich Village, gave each person a boombox with one of four tapes in it, and instructed everyone to hit PLAY at the same time. What followed was a sound unlike anything they had ever heard before: an evanescence filling the air, reverberating off the buildings and city streets as the crowd walked a pre-determined route. Phil says: “In effect, we became a city-block-long stereo system.”
The piece was so popular that it became an annual tradition, and then an international phenomenon, spreading across the USA and to other countries worldwide. Since 1992, it has been presented in 101 cities and four continents, drawing thousands of participants in cities like New York and San Francisco.
New Carson City resident Michael Tedesco thought Carson City would be the perfect place for such an art experience and approached the BAC to coordinate it after one of the Levitt AMP Carson City concerts. After the event, there will be a free performance from the Tintabulations Bell Choir in the Performance Hall. Tintabulations is composed of fourteen talented musicians dressed in black, highlighted with a touch of green, stand behind a length of 30 feet of tables which are laden with 120 glistening bronze bells and chimes. The real magic begins with the drop of the baton by director Barb Walsh, as the bells energetically and sensitively begin soaring through the air resulting in a memorable, enchanting musical experience.
To give it our own Carson City flair, we are encouraging participants to wear their favorite LED wearables to help light up the action as we go. You find out more at https://unsilentnight.com/about.html or you can RSVP for the event at breweryarts.org or call 775-883-1976 for more information.
Unsilent Night: Sun. Dec. 22 at 5:30 p.m, Brewery Arts Center
Tintabulation Bell Choir; Sun Dec. 22 at 7 p.m, Brewery Arts Center Performance Hall
