I wanted to check out The Forty Part Motet, the sound installation at The Cloisters, the Met's medieval annex on the Hudson (possibly the whitest museum north of the Museum of the Confederacy in Richmond, VA). The artist, Janet Cardiff, recorded separately each vocal part of Thomas Tallis' forty-part motet Spem in alium numquam habui (c. 1556-1573). 40 speakers are set up in the Fuentiduña Chapel, one for each voice. You can stand in the middle of the chapel and hear it all together, or listen to one voice at a time on individual speakers. Pretty cool.
Image courtesy Metropolitan Museum
When I got in the car, by chance, the CD in the player was Brian Wilson Presents Smile, the long, long awaited reconstruction of the great lost (or doomed) Brian Wilson-Van Dyke Parks collaboration. The themes may be different from Tallis to Wilson & Parks--God and hope to chickens, vegetables, and surfing--but the purity, the precision, the reverence of voices coming together and standing apart are the same.
So, I'd like to propose the Cloisters host a similar sound exhibit featuring one of the great Beach Boys records, "Good Vibrations," a track originally intended for Smile (and included on the Brian Wilson Presents Smile). A different speaker for each vocal track. It's not likely to broaden the diversity of the museum goers but more exaltation for sure. Listen for yourself:
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