Department of Music

Society of Fellows in the Humanities Lecture Series 2022–2023

The Longest Days and the Shortest Days: A Dialogue on Art & Tech

Date: April 17, 2023 (Monday)
Time: 5:30PM
Delivery: LG1.22 (Rehearsal Room), LG1/F Run Run Shaw Tower, Centennial Campus, HKU

Details and registration:
All are welcome. No registration required.

Speakers:
Eugene Birman, Associate Professor, Academy of Music, Hong Kong Baptist University
Giorgio Biancorosso, Department of Music, HKU

Imagine a piece in which a flesh and blood choir vies for your attention with a virtual one. Projected onto a hologram screen, the virtual choir augments the presence on stage of the live performers as it also threatens to supplant them.

Such is the basic set-up of the tech-cantata The Longest Days and the Shortest Days, performed last September at the Gulbenkian Auditorium in Lisbon. Written for a large choir on a text by acclaimed Portoguese writer Djaimilia Pereira de Almeida, The Longest Days and the Shortest Days explores the solitude and anxiety experienced during the pandemic as an occasion to reflect on the passing of time.

In this conversation, moderated by Yolanda Lam, the authors revisit the creative and technical challenges presented by the work as the starting point for a discussion of the relationship between art and technology today.

Society of Fellows in the Humanities
www.sof.arts.hku.hk

Department of Music
www.music.hku.hk