31 Down
PERFORMANCES
BERRNNARRDD HERRMANN
Saturday, July 17, 2004
@ Santa Fe Art Institute, New Mexico, 1-5 p.m. MDT/3-7 p.m. EDT
31 Down produced this large-scale undertaking for a live studio performance streamed and broadcast live in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
BERRNARRDD HERRMANN is a play set in the last hour in the life of Bernard Herrmann. The famous movie composer that made soundtracks for such famous film as PSYCHO, North By Northwest and Citizen Kane was now living with his third wife in London. He had been brought out of retirement by three young filmmakers from New York (Larry Cohen, Brian Depalma and Martin Scorsese) and Francois Truffaut in France. He was pushing even harder in the last years of his life to the point of an unhealthy breakdown. The younger generations recognized his genius and were quick to cast their movies into cinema immortality at the expense of an aging composer.
Bernard Herrmann finished recording the score for the film Taxi Driver the night he died, never to see the final product, possibly the greatest of all his scores!
Bernard Herrmann was married to his first wife, Louise Fletcher, while he was composing for Orson Wells Mercury Players, which did the famous radio play "War of the Worlds" with a score by Benny himself. Louise Fletcher went on to write one of the greatest radio plays of all times, "Sorry Wrong Number." in which an invalid housewife meets her own demise by eavesdropping on phone conversations. This one-woman show with only her voice audible on one end of a phone conversation was to become the template for 31 Down's reconstruction.
31 Down takes a glance into what may have happened this final night. Using inspired dialogue from Taxi Driver, the imagined telephone conversations of the women in Benny's life and a live band, BERRNNARRDD HERRMANN became 31Down's largest production to date.
Credits:
Bernard Herrmann.........................Mike Sharpie
Martin Scorcese..........................Toots
Louise Fletcher..........................Helen Tremble
With:
Wife 2...................................Rachel Shukert
Wife 3...................................Margaret Rose Champagne
Hitchcock's Secretary....................Shauna Kelly
Operator.................................Karen Koontz
Sound distorter..........................Radio Ruido
Band:
Matt Bua.................................Effects
Andrew piper.............................Bass
Matt Bassett.............................Drums
Script by Ryan Holsopple and Zachery Oberzan
Design and direction by Ryan Holsopple
Tune (IN))) Santa Fe
Attendees listen to performances on radio with headphones, with only ambient sound at the Santa Fe Art Institute Courtyard.
The third in free103point9's Tune(In))) series, this sound installation/event is designed for a virtually silent environment in which listeners hear live performances through individual radio headsets.
"Tune(In))) Santa Fe," features sound and video artists transmitting works directly into four separate FM frequencies. Performing artists will include Shawn O'Neal, Tom Roe, Matt Mikas, Keep Adding, Steina, Andrew Neumann, David Stout, Cory Metcalf, Chris Jonas, Molly Sturges, CK Barlow, and many others. In order to access the performances, listeners must engage and consider the radio spectrum, traversing the dial to the four Tune(In))) FM frequencies, encountering other commercial stations available on the FM radio spectrum, or the minimal ambient noise of the SFAI Courtyard.
One channel featured performances simulcast live from Brooklyn, with Ben Owen, Sarah Lippek, Tianna Kennedy, 31 Down with Matt Bua, neuroTransmitter, Damian Catera, Michelle Nagai, and others simulcast on Radioo, www.radioo.org.
Interstitial performances on the two live Santa Fe channels will feature recorded performances from previous free103point9 Tune(In)))'s. Performances will include Scanner, Matt Valentine + Erika Elder, the SB, Carlos Giffoni, Peggy Ahwesh + Barbara Ess, Sybarite, and Transmaniacon MC.