Null Point music collective leads Ullem Campus Farm outdoor performance Sept. 22

Monday, September 17, 2018
The DePauw School of Music’s 2018-19 concert series continues with “PLACE,” a site-responsive work to be performed by DePauw University music students and Null Point visiting artists at the university’s Ullem Campus Farm, beginning at 10 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 22. Rain date will be 10 a.m. Sunday, Sept. 23. All are welcome to this free event.
Courtesy photo

Colin Tucker and Ethan Hayden, co-curators of the Buffalo-based music collective Null Point, will lead DePauw students in rehearsal and performance of David Dunn’s site-responsive work PLACE (1975), beginning at 10 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 22 with a rain date of Sunday, Sept. 23.

This 10-section, modular performance-installation invites performers and observers alike to experience and interact with the sounds of an outdoor environment — in this case, DePauw University’s new Ullem Campus Farm — using different combinations of instruments, voices and audio gear.

Null Point poses the importance of PLACE through a series of open-ended questions, beginning with: “How can sound art enter into dialogue with a place? How can sound art treat place not as a blank canvas to be gentrified, but instead enter into open-ended conversation with a place’s existing nature-cultures?” Dunn’s work offers partial answers to these questions, which manifest differently in each performance. The 12-acre Ullem Campus Farm site, with its combination of cultivated land, buildings, meadow, path and wooded surroundings, offers a rich ecological network for this exploration.

Fresh produce from the farm also will be available to sample during the performance, which will take place over several hours from late morning into afternoon, with breaks.

“We’d like to invite audience members to experience this piece in their own way. You could walk by on your way to the Nature Park, drop in and out throughout the day, or stay in the sonic environment of the farm for the entire piece, perhaps with a picnic or book,” suggests Professor Eliza Brown, a DePauw music faculty member.

All are welcome to attend this free performance, which is funded by the DePauw School of Music and the Environmental Fellows Program.

If you plan to go, Ullem Campus Farm’s new location is between DePauw’s athletic facilities and Nature Park, behind the Indoor Tennis and Track facility. Organizers recommend taking Jackson to Walnut Street, turning left into the farm immediately after the railway crossing, and following the signs.

Questions about the program may be directed to Prof. Brown (elizabrown@depauw.edu).

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