Playing inside a Giant Flute!

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Peering upwards, my eyes not yet adjusted to the dim light, I could see only blackness. A few test notes, and I realized that the the acoustic was very dry, with a unique finish that only a 200+ foot open-ended column overhead could allow! Playing briefly inside this chimney at Toronto’s Historic Brickworks location was like playing inside a giant flute!

www.evergreen.ca/rethinkspace/

It was a little tough setting up my music – the light was dim, and there was an occasional rush of wind that whistled past, up the column of air that I was at the base of – I had my music and the recorder propped up precariously on a small ledge with a stick – but, with sound of the wind in the bullrushes just outside the waist-high entranceway, I stood and played, making myself temporarily at home in the base of this odd, evocative space, this awe-inspiring vertical shaft, the last of four chimneys left standing at Toronto’s Brickworks site. Inside, the base is maybe 7 feet square, tapering slightly to a faintly visible aperture far, far above…