Climate Concert: Icarus in Flight – online event

Online event (free).We will livestream this event on our Facebook page.

Beatrice Miniaci on the flute, Emil Peltola on the violin, Seamus Hickey on the viola and Dominika Kaczmarczyk on the cello will be performing Icarus in Flight. Icarus in Flight is an original chamber music work by composer Richard Festinger in collaboration with the Climate Music Project. Icarus in Flight models three human drivers of climate change – population growth, fossil fuel use, and land-use change – over two centuries, from 1880-2080. The work is comprised of three large sections played without pause: the first representing the years 1880 to 1945, when the data are growing slowly; the second from 1945 to 2015 when growth accelerates exponentially; and the third from 2015 to 2080, with the use of projected figures, when the audience will be seeing the world change while listening to it.

These drivers connect to the music in the following ways:
1) Population growth controls the average density of musical events over time. In this context, density means the number of musical events in a given time period.
2) Carbon emissions control the frequency range of the music, from lowest to the highest pitch, increasing gradually from a perfect fifth in the middle register to a span of 6.25 octaves, before collapsing to almost nothing.
3) Land-use is represented by the increasing proportion of music that is played with specialized timbres (tone colours), including mainly rapid tremolo, bowing and bowing close to the bridge.

As musicians and artists, we want to explore our own emotional reactions to the changing climate. What is happening to the planet, and how do we feel about it? As our emotional paralysis melts, so can we be inspired to meaningful action rather than inaction.