William Close and The Earth Harp performing at Lightning In A Bottle – a virtual festival.
Silhouetted figures dancing around 3D geometric structures, as the sun sets over a backdrop of rolling hills. Pools of water ripple and reflect light and one shot even captures a bit of the behind-the-scenes action: several golf carts parked just off a dirt path between stages.
All of these scenes will be familiar to the seasoned festival goer. But there’s a catch. No one is going anywhere this summer — at least not to massive outdoor music festivals like Lightning in a Bottle. However, electronic music fans can still dance along from home as they tune into the digital world created for this year’s LIB.
Although it was initially called off in the wake of the novel coronavirus pandemic, this week, Do LaB — the production company behind the Lightning in a Bottle Art and Music Festival — would return Memorial Day Weekend after all. Only now it is a streaming event, dubbed DGTL LIB.
Along with SXSW, Coachella, and many other high-profile music and arts festivals, the perennial Southern California event was cancelled at the start of the year after COVID-19 decimated all prospects of a festival season for Summer 2020 — and beyond.William Close – Lightning in a Bottle alumni – will be performing on Sunday 6:50pm a mini Earth Harp set for DGTL LIB.
WILLIAM CLOSE AND THE EARTH HARP
William Close is an installation artist, musician and visionary who has developed over one hundred new musical instruments including the famed Earth Harp. The body of The Earth Harp rests on the stage while the strings travel over the audience, extending up to 1000 ft. in length, and attach to the back of the venue, turning every space into an instrument.
William studied sculpture and sound design at the Art Institute of Chicago and his work explores the connection between architecture and music. Inspired by the Frank Lloyd Wright quote “architecture is frozen music”, Close creates musical installations that use the architecture as part of the instrument. The Earth Harp has been installed in some of the most iconic destinations in the world such as The Coliseum in Rome, The Kennedy Center and Lincoln Center in the US, The Seattle Space Needle, the temples of Vietnam, Grand Theater of Shanghai International Arts Festival, Brazil’s Theatro Municipal in São Paulo, The Dhow Harbour in Qatar, and major US festivals like Coachella, Bumbershoot, Burning Man and Lightning In A Bottle.
THE EARTH HARP COLLECTIVE
William is the Founder and Artistic Director of the Earth Harp Collective, an internationally renowned performance group that combines the creative forces of artists, musicians, dancers and aerialists.