New Wilderness Foundation
 

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Events, Celebration and Festivals

  • SOLSTICE: SUN CELEBRATIONS 1973 - 89
  • The 12th International Sound Poetry Festival 1980
  • The Great Wind Event 1983
  • Co-production with New Music Chicago: Toot’n Blink for two fleets of boats on Lake Michigan, conducted by radio disc jockeys, on the occasion of John Cage’s 80th birthday. TV and Radio broadcasts.

These outdoor, site specific events with broadcasts were designed a celebration of nature as a common elements in all human societies and all art. The idealist theme was reflected in the broad participation in these projects by artists around New York and around the world. At first these events consisted of artists celebrating in New York with satellite connections to artists celebrating in international locations.

21 June 1973 - Got up early, with the smell of moisture and the likelihood of rain. Grey fog-clad clover is luminous and the sparrows are chirping. It is June 21, 1973 in Central Park fog. Musician, Carol Weber and I walk into the park, having announced our intention to celebrate the first moments of summer for the media.

We invited New Yorkers to join in from their rooftops. The results were so startling that we keep going for so many years, culminating in world broadcasts on radio, then TV. New York City Parks animated with our performances until 1989.

One sun celebration followed another: the sun in the Rockies, the sun on the Pacific, the sun in Lapland, the sun at the United Nations a solar energy event SUNDAY with Robert Redford & Leonard Crowfoot - what a combination, and (as an influence only) the ending of Black Orpheus, the children dancing as the sun rises. Bob Sullivan says “Nature is Robust and Dynamic, Humans are fragile.”

CATALOG

Solstice Events and Wave Music - for each event, I composed a work for a herd of instruments, all cellos, all harps, all woodwinds, all boats, and invited others to compose for them also. This paralleled the network approach started with the New Music for Trumpet and continuing through the Sound Cube.

June 21, 1977, Wave Music for 40 Cellos was produced in Wave Hill.

June 21, 1978, Wave Music II for 100 Musicians with lights was produced in Central Park.

June 21, 1979, Wave Music III for 60 Clarinets and a boat was produced in Battery Park.

June 21, 1980, Wave Music IV for Drum and Bugle Corp was produced in Minneapolis by Walker Art Museum

June 21, 1981, Wave Music V for Conch Chorus and Bagpipe in Damrosche Park.

First international radio solstice
December 21 Second international radio solstice

June 21, 1982, Wave Music VI for Toot'N Blink Chicago, Navy Pier

Third international radio solstice
June 21, 1983, Wave Music VII for 30 Harps was produced in Cathedral of St. John Wave

1984 Fourth International Radio solstice

1985 Poetry solstice from locations around NYC, and around the world

1986 City Wave Copenhagen, with Trevor Davies.

1986 NWF Solstice in Central Park, designed and produced by Marilyn wood, Carol Tuynman

1987 NWF Solstice at New York’s City Hall, TV and radio broadcast with Mayor Ed Koch

1987 Wave Music VIII: 6 Harpsichords, Symphony Space, NY, NY

1988 Solstice at St. John the Divine and Riverside Park (not a wave music), NY

1989 Dawn Solstice at Battery Park. Harbor symphony of boat horns, Sun Ra and his Arkestra with Don Cherry, soloist.

 

 

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