On Saturday, December 12 at 7:00pm, composer Phil Kline will lead a massive chorus of boomboxes from the West Village to the East Village in the 18th annual holiday presentation of UNSILENT NIGHT. People gather at the arch in Washington Square Park, and less than an hour and mile later, end up in Tompkins Square Park.
UNSILENT NIGHT is Kline's free outdoor participatory sound sculpture of many individual parts, recorded on cassettes, CD's and mp3's, and played through a roving swarm of boomboxes carried through city streets every December. People bring their own boomboxes and drift peacefully through a cloud of sound which is different from every listener's perspective.Since its debut in 1992, UNSILENT NIGHT has become a cult holiday tradition in NY, drawing crowds of up to 1,500 participants. It has also grown into a worldwide annual event, presented in over 45 cities and on three continents.Kline says: "Every year I present UNSILENT NIGHT, which is like a Christmas caroling party except we don't sing, but rather carry boomboxes, each playing a separate tape or CD which is part of the piece. In effect, we become a city-block-long stereo system."The Village Voice describes UNSILENT NIGHT as "a marvelously fluid, traveling spatial sound sculpture that disintegrates and reforms at nearly every stop light." Time Out calls the event "an electro-happening" and depicts the music as "a winter wonderland of shimmering sleigh bells, chimes and grand chorales."Videos