Charlotte Symphony has new immersive audio experience at Blumenthal Arts. What to expect
After sending visitors into space, Blumenthal Arts’ next immersive experience at its newest venue will dive into the ocean with the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra.
The orchestra will perform an audio immersive experience of “Become Ocean,” a Pulitzer prize-winning orchestral composition by American composer John Luther Adams, at Blumenthal’s Blume Studios on Post Street, in the Iron District near Bank of America Stadium.
Three shows will be held Feb. 28 and March 1 featuring 360-degree spatial audio, custom lighting and orchestra musicians spatially divided to create a sensory experience, the orchestra announced Thursday.
The CSO described the experience as an “exploration and meditation on the vast, deep, and mysterious tides of existence.”
Each show is about 90 minutes with 80 musicians performing, Charlotte Symphony Orchestra CEO David Fisk said, and limited to 400 people.
“It is going to be a space you can choose where to be and how to listen,” Fisk said. “We want people to lose themselves in this music and to be swallowed up by the experience of being part of nature.”
The orchestra will also partner with the North Carolina Aquarium Society to present activities that celebrate the link between humanity and the oceans. Those details will be announced at a later date.
The orchestra’s audio-immersive experience follows Blumenthal’s September debut of Blume Studios, Charlotte’s first immersive entertainment venue. Blumenthal’s $2.5 million site was converted from a 32,000-square-foot warehouse in Charlotte’s Iron District near uptown.
The first exhibit, “Space Explorers: The Infinite” is a virtual reality journey to the International Space Station created in collaboration with Felix & Paul Studios and PHI Studio, both based in Montreal. The exhibit’s run was extended nearly two months through Jan. 4.
About the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra
“Become Ocean” is part of the orchestra’s exploration of immersive programming, funded by a $210,000 grant from Knight Art + Tech Expansion Fund of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. The grant also funded two immersive performances at BlackBox Theater, Fisk said.
“The (Blume Studios) space will be fantastic for this music and gives us a chance to make it more than just a listening experience, which is what we’re trying to do,” Fisk said.
The conductor for “Become Ocean” is Courtney Lewis, who will be making his debut with the Charlotte Symphony.
The orchestra has been reaching new audiences at venues beyond its traditional home in Belk Theater, including its mobile stage that rolled out in April. The customized trailer with a 40-foot stage holds up to 30 musicians. The mobile stage have moved throughout Charlotte neighborhoods that are “corridors of opportunity.”
“We’re trying to engage the community where they are in way that feels easy, accessible and natural,” Fisk said, “but also deliberately reaching out to new audiences and exploring new programming.”
Led by Music Director Kwamé Ryan, the orchestra employs 65 professional full-time orchestra musicians. The orchestra, which was founded in 1932, presents about 150 concerts each season.
More about ‘Become Ocean’
Adams’ work premiered in 2013 in a performance by the Seattle Symphony Orchestra. In 2014, it won the Pulitzer Prize for Music and the next year it won a Grammy for Best Classical Contemporary Composition.
Adam says in the Seattle program: “If you stop and think about the oceanic dimension of music, there’s this implication of immersion. We came from the ocean, and we’re going back to the ocean, right? We’re made up mostly of water, and life on Earth first emerged from the seas. And with the melting of the polar ice caps and the rising sea levels, we may become ocean sooner than we imagine.”
Adams studied composition with James Tenney and Leonard Stein at the California Institute of the Arts, where he was in the first graduating class in 1973. He was an environmental activist in the 1970s and ’80s before dedicating himself to music.
“He made this choice with the belief that, ultimately, music can do more than politics to change the world,” Adams’ website states.
Want to go?
What: “Become Ocean” audio immersive experience
When: 7:30 p.m. Feb. 28, and 3 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. March 1.
Location: 904 Post St., Charlotte
Tickets: Start at $35 at charlottesymphony.org; they go on sale at 10 a.m. Dec. 19.
More: Two installations on display with “Space Infinite” will remain on view at Blume Studios:
▪ GAIA: Measuring nearly 20 feet in diameter, the floating 3D globe features detailed NASA imagery of the Earth’s surface.
▪ Groundswell: A nearly 20-foot platform that sits atop a sea of 40,000 illuminated steel spheres and tilts as visitors walk on it, with the sound of cascading ball bearings.
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This story was originally published December 19, 2024 at 6:30 AM with the headline "Charlotte Symphony has new immersive audio experience at Blumenthal Arts. What to expect."