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The Challenge:
The Challenge:
REIMAGINE THE FUTURE OF THE SYMPHONY MUSIC EXPERIENCE
REIMAGINE THE FUTURE OF THE SYMPHONY MUSIC EXPERIENCE
The year is 2100. Experiencing live symphonic music has not only survived, it has thrived as three different paradigm shifts started to occur around the year 2020. In this project, we challenge you to dream up these three separate provocations. These provocations should be game-changing, paradigm-shifting, and come from insights gained from interacting with different groups of people out there in the world (e.g. musicians, avid classical musical listeners, people that have never been to the symphony, orchestra directors, etc.).
The Process
The Process
The team spent time interviewing people with varying levels of connection to the symphony world. In addition, the team created prototypes of various concepts that they tested both out in the world and at the weekly NOI concerts at The Clarice.
For example, during the first NOI concert, the team created various activities (a game of cornhole! visual voting boards!) as excuses to strike up conversations with concert attendees to learn about who they are and what their relationship with classical music is like.
Another weekend, the team created prototypes (such as a prototype of telepathic devices that would answer questions that audience members have about the performance, while they’re enjoying the performance) that they tested in Washington, DC with people they encountered both outside of The Renwick Gallery, and then later at The Wharf.
After bringing what they learned from people back to the Studio, the team used various synthesis and ideation techniques to analyze the data, and crafted the following provocations to move forward with:
1. Cultivate multi-sensory concert experience
2. 360 degree immersive symphony
3. Accelerator helping composers hatch radical musical experiments
These provocations became the launching pad for new music experience concepts which were then tested at a live show at MilkBoy ArtHouse, a local performance venue, restaurant and craft bar in downtown College Park.
The Product
The Product
This year, NOI[SE] was a live prototype (and music experience) that featured a collection of performances inspired by provocations that imagine new ways for audiences to interact with orchestral musicians for classical music. The show was crafted to test out new concepts, and gather feedback from live audiences.
Upon arriving, you entered a train station platform where you were greeted by a Train Arrivals/Departures Board and a Booking Clerk that guided you through choosing which musical experiments (taking place in the future) you’d like to journey to that evening.
There were three destinations that evening:
1. The Experiments Parlor: featuring lots of mini-experiments
2. Symphony 360
3. Meditation Station
Check out the gallery below for details on the experiments.
CONCEPT: CAPTURING CURIOSITY WITH VISUAL STIMULI
MUSIC: SCHULHOFF CONCERTINO
This was a sort of sensory deprivation experience where musicians sat behind audience members -- in other words, the audience couldn’t see the musicians. The audience was also in total darkness except for some colorful geometric shapes that moved with the music being projected onto the wall in front of them.
CONCEPT: IMMERSIVE AUDIO EXPERIENCE
MUSIC: PROKOFIEV SONATA FOR TWO VIOLINS
With only a few rows of chairs set out, and music being amplified from speakers both in front of and behind the audience, the audience was invited to move around and find their “sweet spot” to listen to the music.
CONCEPT: DEEPER CONNECTIONS TO MUSICIANS
MUSIC: BACHIANAS BRASILERIAS NO. 6 BY HECTOR VILLA-LOBOS
Each musician in the performing duet was surrounded by a circle of chairs so that the audience members would be seated around them while they played.
CONCEPT: 360-DEGREE IMMERSIVE SYMPHONY EXPERIENCE
MUSIC: BRASS POLKA, HORN QUARTET, LOW BRASS TUNES
The setting for this was in the larger concert space on the second floor of the venue. Musicians were not up on stage, but instead, were at floor-level amidst the audience. Musicians were arranged in a circle, facing inward, but spaced far enough apart for the audience to be able to weave in and out of the circle. Each musician was accented by a circle of paper bag lantern, giving them enough space to breathe, but also inviting audience members to get a bit closer to them, and even look over their shoulder at their music.
CONCEPT: MULTISENSORY EXPERIENCE + MEDITATION
MUSIC: VIOLIN SOLOIST
What was normally “the stage” in the larger concert space in the venue was curtained off with flowy textiles and soft lighting for a meditation space. Audience members gathered sitting cross-legged on floor pillows, while being led vocally and instrumentally through a meditation.
CONCEPT: ACCELERATOR HELPING COMPOSERS HATCH MUSICAL EXPERIMENTS
Flyers for the Foundry5 accelerator were distributed during the experiment showcase. Foundry 5 is an incubator and accelerator program for composers and musicians to create new music and experiences around that music. It seeks to close the loop between composers, musicians and audiences.
More info can be found here. http://bit.ly/Foundry5Flyer
"I like that in Symphony 360, I can be a human balance/fader knob!"
“"I don’t usually listen to classical, but this time, I really heard it, because of the experiments with seating and lighting."
-Audience Reactions to NOI[SE]
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