Disquiet

When the SF Playhouse shudders, physically, during its current run of the Tracy Letts play Bug, the source of that mix of noise and physical sensation isn’t the actors wandering around a creaky stage, or the audience shifting in their well-worn seats. It’s the thick buzzing sound that is used, along with the traditional blanketing darkness, to note the transition between scenes. I saw the play, directed by Jon Tracy, this past Friday, and was struck by the production’s use of sound, not just to move from one segment of the tautly told story to the next, but to fill each scene with a sense of place and, true to Bug‘s emphasis on surveillance and paranoia, of foreboding.

The entire play takes place in a single, seedy motel room. It tells the story of the quick and intense bonding of two emotionally damaged individuals: a single woman, whose ex-husband had been released from prison, and a younger man, who reveals deeper levels of paranoia with each confession. The title subject refers to both the insect and the listening device, and to the frightening idea of a combination thereof.

From the circling helicopters, to nearby Latin American techno, to an occasionally used boombox on the motel room floor, to the substandard air-conditioning unit that is so constant in its mechanical whir that it serves double duty as the play’s score, the sound in Bug is as much a part of the production as are the actors and the set. The sound in Bug isn’t just background; in a dramatic sense, it has a narrative agency all its own.

As it turns out, the sound design in the production, which runs through June 14, is by Cliff Caruthers, an accomplished locally based musician who’s performed at the San Francisco Electronic Music Festival (where he is technical director), the San Francisco Tape Music Festival (where he is co-curator), and 964 Natoma (Aaron Ximm‘s former curatorial venue in San Francisco).

More on the production at sfplayhouse.org.

Simple astonishment is as best as I can sum up the sensation that accompanied the recent news that a funding crisis has struck the estimable institution STEIM, based in Amsterdam. The following statement opened an appeal for support at the organization’s website, steim.org:

Things are not well at STEIM. We are in the danger of losing our structural funding from the government, based on a review from the advisor board which called us ‘closed and only appealing to a niche audience’. The outlook isn’t exactly bleak, but at the moment our future is unclear.

This is the letter that I sent in STEIM’s support:

I write this note in something of a sense of astonishment. To hear that STEIM’s funding is in question came unexpectedly. In the world beyond the institution’s walls — and by “world” I mean the globe in its entirety — STEIM is, to those involved in the pursuit of extending music’s boundaries, synonymous with excellence.

Those five letters can make all the difference on the CV of one of the organization’s fellows — anyone with STEIM experience is seen as having been at the root of the culture, and returned all the wiser to spread the word.

STEIM’s efforts in education, curation, concert promotion and, most importantly, research puts it in the highest order of arts institutions.

It’s been reported that some in the position of judging STEIM’s validity relegate it to a “niche.”

I trust that is a mis-characterization of the concerns of the governing body. The matters that STEIM is focused on — from the digital mediation of information to the role of technology in culture to networked communication — are high on the minds of everyone in business, government, the military, and the arts. The innovations, technological and theoretical, that surface at STEIM have far-reaching implications and applications.

Thank you for providing this opportunity to speak on the organization’s behalf. I truly hope that STEIM’s funding will be continued.

Best regards,

Marc Weidenbaum

The due date for the next stage of STEIM’s appeal is imminent. STEIM needs to collect any letters of support by May 26, which is this coming Monday. A web form has been set up at steim.org to enable supporters to make their voices heard. For further context, the following websites are among those that have raised the alarm about STEIM’s status: createdigitalmusic.com, em411.com, makezine.com, matrixsynth.blogspot.com, musicthing.blogspot.com.