Montreal artist puts on unique show inside Sask. water tower
Sound performance collects, mixes sounds from inside the century-old building
Humboldt, Sask., residents were recently treated to a concert inside an unusual venue — their decommissioned water tower.
Jen Reimer, who received a Canada Council grant to produce a show, recorded sounds inside the tower during her first visit to central Saskatchewan last year.
"I was going to different spaces across the country and when I came here, the wind was so present. It activated the resonant frequencies of the tower. I could learn a lot about the architecture just listening," Reimer said.
Reimer created a "site-specific composition."
She set up multiple speakers and monitors at different heights inside the 25-metre high tower using hundreds of metres of cable. Reimer then mixed the sounds and played them back during a series of concerts inside the tower last week.
She hosted multiple concerts throughout the day last Thursday for small groups to accommodate the small space. The audience could even listen from different points.
"I'm encouraging people to go up the stairs and hear it from different perspectives, because I think it is a moving, a walking composition where it changes depending on where you are in the space," she said.
Reimer said the metal tower produced a wide variety of sound, with the wind and passing trains adding even more.
Audience member Ivan Buehler said he loved it.
"I thought it was a wonderful opportunity. I'm very thankful for the vision of the artist who recognized what could be done in there and went ahead and played around and created a great show," Buehler said.
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With files from Trevor Botherel