IF MUSIC WERE A BUILDING
Jun 1, 2004 12:00 PM, David Weiss
If you're afraid that people aren't using enough four-syllable words to discuss music these days, then you missed a series of New York City lectures called “Resonating Frequencies.” Hosted by the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art and put together by sound artist and curator Christopher Janney, the thought-provoking series kicked off on March 31 with a discussion between Paul Miller, aka DJ Spooky That Subliminal Kid, and architect Greg Lynn.
Moderated by Janney, the stated purpose of the two-man panel was to get the sizable audience's heads around the question, “If architecture is frozen music, then is music liquid architecture?” As it turns out, neither the music man nor the builder man made much of an attempt to actually address this topic, but anyone in search of an intellectual think tank on the parallels between audio and architecture got their money's worth.
After a short introduction by Janney that called out traditional fusions of the two disciplines, such as bell towers and public clocks, the main point was that music is a temporal art that changes over time whereas architecture (once completed) is static. Next, the always-engaging Miller took the stage armed with a turntable and a laptop projecting plenty of visuals, with a talk full of Spookyisms such as “porous nation-state,” “reverse engineering” and “post-rationalize.” Next, Lynn demonstrated how CAD design for architects is not unlike the processes going down in a synthesizer. In the moderated discussion that followed, the huge words flew fast and furious between the panelists. Some of them even made sense together!
With subsequent talks featuring the likes of Philip Glass, Laurie Anderson and Moby, the “Resonating Frequencies” series put a smart and entertaining eye on two vital art forms.
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