A heartbreaking hymn to Mother Earth
Song of Extinction combines film, music and choirs to tell environmental story
If you are creating a work of art examining the end of life on our planet, a giant, rusting, industrial relic is the perfect setting.
The “postapocalyptic” feel of the abandoned Hearn Generating Station, where this year’s Luminato Festival is being presented, was exactly what Carol Gimbel was seeking for her immersive art project, Song of Extinction.
“As a backdrop for this piece, it is perfect,” says Gimbel, whose company Music in the Barns creates immersive art experiences in non traditional venues. It has been performed in the Wychwood Barns, which were once a streetcar repair facility.
Song of Extinction, which is having its world premiere Wednesday, is produced by Music in the Barns and co-presented by Luminato. It combines film by documentarian Marc de Guerre, music composed by Rose Bolton with a libretto provided by Griffin Award-winning poet Don McKay that is sung by two choirs. A band comprised of a string septet, two keyboards and electronic music will play the original score for which the movie was specifically cut.
Although the trio worked on their parts separately, they frequently shared their work, says McKay, who was happy to tackle the topic of the gradual extinction of Earth’s species. But this is no lecture.
“It’s not hectoring. It’s more elegiac,” says McKay, adding that people are not just affecting nature but are also being affected by it in turn.
“We’re in the middle of it and we’re partly responsible for it. We’re in a complex situation. We need to handle the emotions around that.”
He created 15 poems, inspired frequently by images or ideas provided Song of Extinction by de Guerre, ranging in title from “Out of the Caves” and “Progress” to “How it Got Dark” and “Oracle.” As each section was written, Bolton wrote the music, recorded herself singing the song and then sent it to McKay.
All three agreed upon the arc of the 50-minute production which is basically the history of Earth, with the story becoming darker in the second half.
Bolton, who set out to “create music that is emotional,” plays electronic music from her laptop that is “an atmospheric wash of sound.” Sometimes it is in the background; at other times it cloaks the other music, she says.
Bolton chose two choirs, Tafelmusik Chamber Choir and VIVA! Youth Singers of Toronto, to create a large, beautiful sound.
“The voice of choir, the feeling of multiple voices, is us humans. The young people are our future.”
Bolton has worked on numerous film scores for de Guerre, who has won Emmys for his documentaries, including The Disappearing Male looking at the link between chemicals and damaged sperm.
De Guerre says this film is “impressionistic,” without the usual stark symbols of environmental degradation. He termed it an “existential” look at the environment that sparks an emotional response.
“I want it to work like music that is heartbreaking. You don’t understand why, but you feel it. This is in that mode, a heartbroken song about the end of the world, the collapse of our civilization. It is poetical. I want people to be moved.”
He says that nature is art and the film captures the enormity of the planet and how small we are in it. He also played with scale so that an owl’s head fills the entire 50-foot screen upon which the film is shown.
“There are no images in this that are going to be familiar,” says de Guerre, who used many archival images that are in the public domain but rarely accessed.
McKay sums up the creative experience: “It’s like we are playing on the Titanic as it is going down and the song is ‘The Ship is Sinking.’ ”