Evolution of Human Consciousness, With Words, Music and Brain Imagery
Give the composer Bruce Adolphe credit for taking on the big issues. Inspired by the research and writings of the neuroscientist Antonio Damasio, who directs the Brain and Creativity Institute at the University of Southern California, Mr. Adolphe asked Mr. Damasio to collaborate on a work that would combine text, music and imagery of brain activity to evoke the evolution of the human mind. Mr. Adolphe also recruited Yo-Yo Ma, an old friend from his Juilliard School days, for the collaboration.
The result was “Self Comes to Mind,” a 30-minute work for cello and two percussionists, with video imagery based on brain scans and with texts by Mr. Damasio. The piece had its premiere on Sunday night at the American Museum of Natural History. The 900-seat LeFrak Theater was packed for the event, which included an hourlong discussion with the collaborators.
Just how the human brain works remains one of the greatest mysteries in science. In his program note Mr. Adolphe suggests that music itself may be an expression of our physical minds, though, he adds, composing is never a matter of musical illustration, but of finding “technical and expressive parallels to extra-musical ideas.”
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The visual element used brain scans from the research of Mr. Damasio’s wife, Hanna Damasio, also a professor of neuroscience at U.S.C. The images were folded into sound-reactive video compositions directed by Diego Miralles, based on an existing video by Ioana Uricaru. Even though the imagery was responding to the music, it was hard not to hear Mr. Adolphe’s obliging music as illustrative of the imagery.
Read the whole thing at nytimes:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/05/arts/music/05ma.html?_r=1&ref=music
