Music of the city's parks, in miniature.
The Thickening Place, Sat., July 26 (concert at 8 p.m., Aug. 2 & August 9 at Le Petit Versailles, 346 E. Houston (betw. Aves. B & C), 212-529-8815.
For me, living near a park in New York City is necessary for survival. Something about a space dedicated to trees and grass and recreation is the perfect remedy for the claustrophobia that the urban jungle can instill in a young immigrant from upstate. But?and this is often confusing to a native New Yorker?the parks, however beautiful and wonderful, are not slices of nature. It is difficult to find a spot isolated from views of the surrounding buildings that are imposing reminders of the megalopolis that swallowed and polluted the original landscape.
Even when you've managed to find yourself in a fully hidden spot, the sounds give it away. The rumble of traffic, the booming bass of hiphop blaring from portable stereos, the constant and inevitable drone of the city that never sleeps. These sounds are an integral and loveable part of the New York City park phenomena?sharing the stage with birds, crunching leaves, and the gentle lapping of water.
It is the story of these parks, through their own language, that Paul Hogan hopes to tell through The Thickening Place, a sound installation exploring the acoustic topography of New York City parks, to open at Le Petit Versailles on the Lower East Side this weekend. Like so many who come to New York as an adult, Hogan, who arrived at Columbia two years ago by way of Maryville, TN and Cincinnati, has been hypersensitive to the cacophony of sounds that characterizes everyday life here. With the help of renowned ethnomusicologist Steven Feld, who just ended his brief tenure at Columbia, Hogan began to listen more deeply.
Having immersed himself in the cultures of Papua New Guinea's indigenous groups for the past 25 years, Feld came to understand that their musical practices were inherently related to the space they inhabited, influenced by geography and the natural sounds that surround them. Each piece of music in some way reflects an interaction with the land, whether it be a journey that one has taken, an experience someone had or simply the sounds that they are accustomed to hearing.
This approach to music-making informs Hogan's project, an installation in a 40-by-60-foot community garden wedged between Houston and 2nd St. The work is a sonic documentation of Hogan's journeys to parks in all five boroughs?including Central Park, Riverside Park, Brighton Beach, Flushing Meadows and Great Kills. Through field recordings and meditative time in each location, Hogan gleaned the sounds that, to him, embodied each park's atmosphere. Ripping them from their natural state, he recontextualizes the sounds, altering dynamic levels and rhythmic pulses, changing them from timeless soundscapes to narratives. Speakers placed around the garden will emit various looped compositions derived from each of the visited parks. Visitors are handed a map and invited to explore the space on their own, essentially having their own experience within the framework of Hogan's outings.
A doctoral candidate at Columbia, Hogan's musical background is unquestionably his own. His concert works often incorporate electronics, giving them a shimmering, otherworldly quality. Out of the carefully manipulated noise of his compositions comes distinctive drum 'n' bass strains and gamelan-influenced trances. Part of the opening of the installation will be a short concert of some of his most recent works?a series of songs that he describes as existing somewhere between folk songs and art songs, in the vein of Brian Eno and Laurie Anderson. Although composed for oddball instruments such as the accordion and toy pianos, he admits that these songs discretely reveal his Tennessee roots.