Attend the Brickyard Broadcast concert—in VR!—on Nov. 12

How do composers work with orchestras and choirs when they can’t be in the studio together? And, for that matter, how do we attend their performances when we can’t gather together in an audience?

Composer Lisa Bielawa has the answer—in virtual reality.

The Department of Music presents the Brickyard Broadcast on Thursday, Nov. 12 at 6:00 p.m. NC State orchestras and choirs team up with the Concert Singers of Cary to perform the world premiere of a new work by composer Lisa Bielawa entirely in virtual reality on a digital Brickyard built by the NC State University Libraries.

To attend the 20-minute concert, you walk around an interactive VR version of the Brickyard on Twitch (https://www.twitch.tv/ncsulibraries), moving between different avatars of the many musicians involved. You can wander the bricks, listening to musicians from the NC State orchestras (Raleigh Civic Symphony and Raleigh Civic Chamber Orchestra), the NC State choirs (State Chorale, Vox Accalia and Singing Statesmen), and the Concert Singers of Cary, all performing Bielawa’s composition.

The performance integrates hundreds of audio recordings created by the individual musicians playing and singing in isolation under the guidance of Bielawa, orchestral studies director Peter Askim, and choral activities director Nathan Leaf. The texts that the choirs are singing draw upon writings about the idea of people gathering in common space from authors including H.G. Wells, Wallace Stegner, Frank Lloyd Wright, Charles Ives, and others.

After the event, join Bielawa, Askim, and Leaf for a discussion about the project.

For more information about the Brickyard Broadcast, visit the project page and read this feature on the Music Department’s news site.