25 August 2016 (gig)
28 August 2016
To celebrate its fiftieth anniversary this year, the Roundhouse is bringing back the Curtain Call. Brought by Ron Arad, an internationally renowned artist, this 360° immersive installation is both a visual and audio experience. Last week, we were at the London Contemporary Orchestra gig and plunged into another world.
The Curtain Call is a unique experience: a floor-to-ceiling artwork made of 5600 silicon rods, arranged to cover an 18 metres circle in the middle of the Roundhouse where images and videos are projected whilst music is played. You can move around the space, get either into or outside the circle for a full 360° event.
Last Thursday, five pieces were offered to the audience. John Tavener’s piece called “Svyati” took place in what looked like fjords and was brutally moving: the choir, the music and the images all came together to tell us the story of a tribe.
“Down” was a relaxing interlude before Morton Feldman’s “Rothko Chapel”. This piece was probably a tad too long and repetitive, displaying images of close-ups to stones accompanied by the choir and percussions similar to a woodpecker’s peculiar drum.
“You Belong To Me” by Mica Levi was truly amazing: the quartet of strings were playing together, watching each other’s every move, coordinating their movements and synching their rhythm. The music was more dynamic and entertaining; the videos and images were working together with the live performance.
The last piece was “Sky Piece to Jesus Christ” by Yoko Ono. The musicians were facing the audience in a circle. As they started playing, some other artists started bandaging them and constricting their movements up to the point they couldn’t play their instruments anymore. It was quite a strange thing to witness. When the concert ended, as no musician was able to move anymore, there was a sort of communion between the audience and the wrapped-up musicians: all were smiling, laughing and the atmosphere got relaxed.
Overall, this Curtain Call experience was all sorts of weird. But it was definitely a nice set-up and a new way of experimenting live music. I would recommend giving it a go, maybe next year for the Roundhouse’s 51st anniversary.
