My office today: set up to play #Xenakis’ #Persephassa in #Waterloo Park for the #Random #Walks festival with #TorQ #Percussion, Ben Duinker and Aiyun Huang. Would be the perfect day for it except for the 30kph wind.
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Man Runs Out of Gas on Interstate, Sets Up Drum Kit to Kill Time →
On Tuesday morning, a man driving on the Baltimore Beltway ran out of gas. So he did what anyone would do: He pulled over to the shoulder of I-695, set up his drum kit, and began to play until help arrived.
The best. I would like to shake this dude’s hand.
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Reduce, reuse, recycle. Rehearsal @ArrayMusic for @TorQPercussion & Evergreen Gamelan. #InTheCage
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Truck (mostly) packed for #TorQNewManoeuvers load in at Dancemakers today. @torqpercussion
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…TorQ quartet gave the singers a break with a mesmerizing all-percussion arrangement (by Jamie Drake) of “Jerusalem” that had been inspired by hearing the Soweto Gospel Choir.
— An excerpt from a nice review by John Terauds of MusicalToronto.org on TorQ’s concert with the Larkin Singers earlier this month. Read the whole review here.
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Blake Fall-Conroy, “Minimum Wage Machine,” 2008-2010
This machine allows anyone to work for minimum wage for as long as they like. Turning the crank on the side releases one penny every 4.97 seconds, for a total of $7.25 per hour. This corresponds to minimum wage for a person in New York.
This piece is brilliant on multiple levels, particularly as social commentary. Without a doubt, most people who started operating the machine for fun would quickly grow disheartened and stop when realizing just how little they’re earning by turning this mindless crank. A person would then conceivably realize that this is what nearly two million people in the United States do every day…at much harder jobs than turning a crank. This turns the piece into a simple, yet effective argument for raising the minimum wage.
