00:00
We were instructed to use the toilet before entering the performance space. The piece will be 74 minutes, the woman in black said. If you have to wee during the show, you will not be allowed back in. Also, the piece will include four minutes of silence.
I am at the Tura New Music Festival to see a friend play in Michael Pisaro’s piece entitled A Wave and Waves. My friend is a professional musician and conductor. He plays numerous instruments including guitar, mandolin, and drums. Tonight, however, he will be playing the pebbles.
As I waited to enter the Midland Railway Workshop, an enormous warehouse on the outskirts of Perth, I told my friends about the show I saw two nights ago. One musician used a hair comb, some alligator clips and a cello bow to make a variety of sounds on her classical harp. There was also a song called Concerto for Active Frogs where seven people wearing garbage bags croaked along to a recording of North American frog mating calls. On the way home, I asked my husband what he thought about the show and he asked me how much I had paid for tickets.
My feelings about music of this sort are similar to my feelings about deep fried Snickers bars or Michael Moore: unrelenting, but also why not and thank god.
01:00
The audience is interspersed among the 100 percussionists who are positioned in a grid formation. My friend is standing at attention, as if guarding Buckingham Palace. In front of him is a large tray with a sloped square piece of granite and hundreds of white pebbles. Another performer stands with a violin bow and a wooden block. I spot a man with an enormous ream of white paper and a woman with a bass drum. There are at least five other pebble stations, and a large digital timer affixed to the wall.
01:58
The piece started two minutes ago, but only now am I hearing a squeaky bowing sound. When I crane my neck to see where the sound is coming from, my neck cracks loudly.
03:36
My friend is not yet playing his pebbles. His eyes are closed and he looks like he is meditating. I am concerned he will miss his cue to come in. I remind myself this is not my responsibility.
10:20
The man with the paper begins to tear one of sheets like he is slowly opening a candy bar. I remember that Halloween is on Tuesday.
11:40
My friend takes two handfuls of pebbles and slowly releases them on the higher end of the granite. The sound of cascading stones is pleasant and I close my eyes. In twenty seconds he is done, and returns to his meditative stance.
19:20
I have this plot issue in a story I’m writing. A woman makes a choice and I’m not sure it’s a choice she would make. I wonder how this character would feel about this show and I decide she would have left ten minutes ago. I close my eyes.
23:40
My friend starts with the pebbles again. I try to get his attention and he ignores me. He is taking this very seriously and I am a horrible person.
31:20
I am terrified I might fart. I don’t need to fart, but I know I mustn’t so I’m worried I might.
36:00
Four minutes of silence. I notice a performer in the back who has beautiful long white hair with pink and purple streaks. She looks familiar. Her eyes are closed and she is swaying slightly.
47:40
The music is steadier now and the crescendos feel like pressure points, sending warmth up my spine. My friend is vigorous with his pebbles and they are bouncing off the granite onto the cement floor.
62:20
I remember. Two years ago, I was on a bus in Perth with the woman with the long white hair with the pink and purple streaks. She was severely injured when the door ripped off her big toenail. I wrote a story about this incident and submitted it to two publishers. Now this woman is across from me in a warehouse playing a drum.
74:00
The piece is over but no one is moving or applauding. Someone finally starts clapping and soon the room erupts.
My friend looks tired from all the standing and pebble tossing. We congratulate him and ask to touch the pebbles. This was his second performance today, and now he is free to join us for margaritas. I tell everyone I’ll meet them out front and run to find the woman with the long white hair and the pink and purple streaks.