From Greensboro, NC, USA to a vending machine in Krakow, Poland

Rite of Spring (Garden) / 1st anniversary of a failure

Spring Garden is a street in Greensboro, North Carolina, USA.

Starting downtown, it runs straight West crossing the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG) campus.

Keep going about one mile and you’ll be at my place.

In August 2019, at the beginning of a new academic year, visual artist and UNCG professor Lee Walton and I created a performance involving a minivan loaded with a huge sound system. Driven by an employee of the van owner, the vehicle was supposed to drive for fifteen minutes, each Thursday at noon, on Spring Garden St., between classes when the campus streets were full of students.

Week after week, these small interventions would have created some buzz and expectation, leading to a final party around the van.

For the first run, as an opener and a test, we just played a straight recording of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring.

I then created four remixes, revisiting the original version, each time deconstructing the material even more (it could have gone way further…)

On the second run, the driver showed up very late, when most of the students were already in class….we missed the point.

The third run, using the first remix, was successful, creating the curiosity we wanted on campus.

And then…

The driver (possibly due to the lack of interest from the van owner) didn’t show up anymore, pretending issues with the van, other priorities…there were no further performances and no culminating party.

That was the end of the Rite of Spring Garden.

One year later, I was invited by Polish composer and artist Marek Choloniewski to propose a project for their Audiomat series, 10 copies of a CD sold for 1 euro each in a vending machine in a bar in Krakow, Poland.

This was the occasion to turn the failure into an exciting output.

I reworked a piece made from electrostatic waves for ensemble Vortex, created a new pieces “Ghosts of Spring Garden” and seven short jingles, like neons lights on the street that I added to the four original remixes.

From Greensboro, NC, USA to a vending machine in Krakow, Poland

Rite of Spring (Garden) / 1st anniversary of a failure

One year later, I was invited by Polish composer and artist Marek Choloniewski to propose a project for their Audiomat series, 10 copies of a CD sold for 1 euro each in a vending machine in a bar in Krakow, Poland.

This was the occasion to turn the failure into an exciting output.

I reworked a piece made from electrostatic waves for ensemble Vortex, created a new pieces “Ghosts of Spring Garden” and seven short jingles, like neons lights on the street that I added to the four original remixes.

All the pieces feature on the CD “Rite of Spring” Garden, released in September 2020

AUDIOMAT