• NEW YORK CITY ELECTROACOUSTIC MUSIC FESTIVAL •

JUNE 2-8, 2014

ABRONS ARTS CENTER, NEW YORK

This expressionist computer music composition commemorates the innocents who died on September 11, 2001 because of the fanatic jihadist attack on two US cities, New York and Washington, D.C. The composer, Sal Sofia, though living at the time in Seattle, Washington, lived in Brooklyn, New York for most of his life and the incomprehensible images of the planes crashing into the Twin Towers in New York City are the searing images for the inspiration of this composition and his expression of loving memory for those lives lost and their families. From the onset of the composition Sofia states what he perceives - there is no rationalization, no whitewash, no playing down - of the acts we all witnessed that day and the people that died because of it. Live Forever begins with a short soundscape of planes flying erupting into an unbearable sound that breaks through the heart. Crashing and huge sombre sounds, all-enveloping, surrounding the listener can only begin to convey the perception of the unimaginable of trying to live through the maze of metal skeletry the Twin Towers had become. There is a moment in the piece where the largeness of the sobering surround sound quiets and a small ringing sound is heard like that of an elevator announcing it arrival…its effect like that of Edvard Munch’s The Scream, like time stopping this inconceivable insanity for some kind of comprehension. Yet, time has not stopped nor is there an explanation for the madness that is happening and causing these events as the soundscapes continue with loud unbearable crashes, rushing sounds of repetitive motion, giving the impression of moving fast downward on metal flights of stairs toward loud unbearable breaking noise, screaming sounds of scraping metal, collapsing, crashing, surrounding the listener with a sombre ending of never ceasing sound that slowly fades. The pictured art depicts that fatal moment in time when all ceased to be sane in New York City. Yet it also depicts…we are resilient…we pray as time moves on. The image of a fluid clock illustrates that time does not stop. The written words portray that when faced with a situation impossible to understand we turn to a God for clarity and sanctuary. And, the final message, in the lower right hand corner of the picture, relates that this is not the first time insane acts of mass killing has besieged the human race. Will we ever learn?