Laurie Anderson Celebrates Birthday with the Dogs

Written By: evan on June 4, 2010 No Comment

If you’re an acclaimed artist who has achieved both commercial and academic success, how do you celebrate your birthday? With something completely ridiculous, apparently. On June 5th, on her 63rd birthday, Laurie Anderson is presenting a concert for dogs at the Sydney Opera House.

Laurie Anderson has composed a 20 minute work to create a shared experience for you and your dog. The morning will be an inter-species social gathering on a scale never seen before in Australia. The site will open from 9am where breakfast can be purchased at our specially created doggie cafe, including freshly brewed coffee, egg & bacon rolls and doggie biscuits.

Strangely, there is no information about this concert on Anderson’a website. This leads me to wonder exactly what she has planned. This could be a concert of old music, or it could be a silent concert, or it could just be a fun day out with the dogs. Whatever it is, it will probably be fun.

via Noise for Airports

UPDATE:

nme.com gives credit to Anderson’s husband, Lou Reed. Also, most sites seem to be reporting that Reed’s Metal Machine Music will also be played at some point.

That is an interesting juxtaposition. A piece for canine ears will have parts that are silent to human ears. Anyone familiar with Metal Machine Music knows that it is often played as roughly an hour of very very loud distortion. So, a piece that can’t be consciously heard, and a piece that can’t be consciously ignored.

UPDATE 2:

ABC brings us a short video explanation of what Laurie is doing in Australia. And the BBC says that the concert went off famously.

It featured the cries of whales and high-pitched electronic sounds inaudible to human ears, accompanied by a bass guitar and violin.

For an hour or so Australia’s most recognisable building became a giant kennel.

The sounds sent some agitated pets into a frenzy, while others seemed rather bemused.

“Most dogs are fine with it but we had to move away because he was getting a little bit freaked out by the whale noises,” said one dog owner.

Ms Anderson said it was one of the best moments of her career.