David Byrne invites Minnesotans to ‘play a building’

"Byrne calls it a great equalizer, a democratizer, because having musical skills or lacking them makes little difference. He can see how some people might be initially reluctant to play it, remembering how they gave up their piano lessons as a child."

” ...a democratic musical experience.”

"Situated on the corner of 1st Street and First Avenue in Minneapolis, the stately brick building now called Aria was once home to Theatre de la Jeune Lune. Today it's an event space, and currently home to a unique audio-visual exhibit."

“There are no “Do Not Touch” warnings anywhere in this situation.”

"I'd recommend giving yourself multiple visits."

Art that hits all the right notes

"I think the best thing I've seen recently was a label. It read 'Please Play' and it was painted in yellow letters on the scuffed concrete of the Roundhouse in London."

A great venue to play: David Byrne’s Roundhouse installation

"Buildings and musical instruments are usually quite easy to tell apart."

David Byrne: Playing the Building

“I discovered gobbing,” he says, “and then understood why the Ramones wore leather jackets.”

David Byrne on playing the building at the Roundhouse

"It was always a big mistake to regard David Byrne as merely the guy with the staring eyes who wore funny suits in Talking Heads."

Byrning Down the Roundhouse

"Pressing the keys on the organ sends signals up the wires, which are connected to different parts of the building. Air is blown through hollow pipes to create flute-like sounds, while other surfaces are tapped with hammers, producing a bizarre cacophony of whistling, rumbling and clanging."

David Byrne

"The organ, which essentially controls the sounds, is an invitation to experiment, practice, or freely improvise."

Interview with Anne Pasternak

Best Public Art Event: “Playing the Building”

"Creative Time and David Byrne teamed up this summer to re-think what it means to energize a deserted structure for a whole new audience by rigging an entire building for sound."

Bloomberg Plays the Building

"Mayor Mike looks like he was concentrating pretty hard on the David Byrne/Creative Time collaborative installation, Playing the Building, earlier today. Many city residents have come and played it before him, and you can tickle the ivories, too, up until August 24th."

Abandon Normal Instruments

"The great hall of New York's Battery Maritime Building is singing, groaning, rattling and sighing. Pipes clank furiously, like a school band let loose in a scrapyard. Girders vibrate at frequencies so low, you'd think a passing steamship was sounding its foghorn."

Playing Walls of Sound

"They weren't playing an organ. They were playing the building."

The Pipes, The Pipes are Calling

"I still imagine that sometimes art or some cultural activity can alter the way we see things," said Mr. Byrne in an interview on May 15. "I sense that when the activity is in the public sphere it has greater odds of doing this than in a gallery."

WNYC - Playing the building

"The man who burned down the house is now playing the building."

David Byrne’s art organ rocks New York building

"Using a revamped antique pedal organ, Byrne has transformed the empty Battery Maritime Building into a musical instrument that visitors can play."

David Byrne: Sonic Architect

"David would like it if you came and had a go at the organ."

My Building Has Every Convenience

"A battered pump organ sits on the concrete floor of the peeling and long-abandoned great hall of the Battery Maritime Building. Tubes and wires trail off into the rafters, as if either the instrument or the architecture were in critical condition and one were keeping the other on life support."

David Byrne’s New Band, With Architectural Solos

"When you get both hands busy on the keyboard — as anyone who comes to see the work will be allowed to do — the room roars and clatters to life, seeming to harbor an invisible band playing something written by Philip Glass in collaboration with the Stooges, a Japanese sho virtuoso and a kitchen full of 3-year-olds with pots and ladles."

This Building is Sound

"Through a series of tubes, motors and solenoids, visitors can “play” the Beaux Arts edifice, creating pinging, rumbling and blowing sounds by hitting the keys."

A Building for a Song

"Because it's not an instrument that's been around for a while, there's no virtuosos. The public senses that. So they lose some of their natural inhibitions about playing on it."

Art for All

"Art - viewing or collecting it, at any rate - doesn't make you a better person or raise your moral standards in any way."

Former ‘Talking Head’ turns factory into instrument

"'It's a very democratic instrument, everyone is reduced to the same amateur level,' said Byrne."

Artiste of the Week

"When he plays a factory, he PLAYS A FACTORY..."

David Byrne Plays a Factory, Teams With Fatboy Slim

"Remember that ultra-neat homemade "guitar" you crafted as a child? Thought you were hot stuff, stretching those rubber bands across the top of Mom's Keds box, huh?"

Playing Färgfabriken

"Ten years later David Byrne has turned the main hall into a musical instrument."