9:40am | Add up all the Coffee Bean & Tea Leafs, It’s a Grinds, and Starbuckses¹ in Long Beach, and you find over two dozen chain coffeehouses existing in a city that features a treasure trove of fabulous indie coffeehouses that even San Francisco would respect.

But San Francisco, a city with 50% more people than Long Beach and a helluva lot more tourism, has only about half as many coffeehouse franchises. Why? Part of the reason must be that San Franciscans are better at appreciating the things original to their city than are Long Beachers.

There’s probably a whole essay that could be dedicated to this presumptive phenomenon², but this isn’t it. Rather, while I absolutely advocate generally appreciating and supporting the aspects of Long Beach unique to our city, this piece is just a reminder that one of those unique aspects, SoundWalk, is coming this weekend.

For the uninitiated, SoundWalk is a yearly, one-night-only event featuring sound-art installations set up throughout the East Village Arts District. For this, the seventh iteration of SoundWalk, over 30 installations will be available for viewing/listening from 5:00-10:00pm on Saturday, October 2nd, at both indoor and outdoor locations spread throughout the area bordered by Linden Ave., Elm Ave., Ocean Blvd., and 3rd St.

But here I was talking to the uninitiated, and I told you where and when, but not what. What is sound art?

We’re all familiar with music. Think of music as a specialist subcategory of sound art. Then think about how to define music. How would you explain to a man from Mars which (collection of) sound(s) qualifies as music and which does not, and why? Presuming your man from Mars didn’t take anything for granted, you’d quickly find your explanation to be far more difficult than it probably seemed be at first.

This gives you a little taste of the philosophy behind the creation of sound-art installations, pieces that employ all manner of sound and soundmaking to (re)frame and (re)focus the listener’s consideration of sound—not only in terms of the pieces themselves, but also of the environment within which they exist (which, after all, offers its own ambient sound). The results range from loud to nearly silent, from meditative to comical, from the everyday to the never-before-heard.

Moreover, sound-art installations usually have a visual and/or interactive component of one sort or another, so what you’ll end up getting at SoundWalk is a feast for the senses. If you’ve been to Burning Man³, you’re familiar with the concept. In fact, artists often create work for both Burning Man and SoundWalk in a single year. Doug Hart is an example of that this time around. Fresh off his work on a Burning Man art car, his description of his contribution to this year’s SoundWalk, AUDIOPOLIS, provides a glimpse of what you’ll encounter in the East Village Saturday evening:

AUDIOPOLIS is designed to unfold like a mystery. An unsuspecting participant happens upon four speakers. In the middle of this “aural arena” is a bevy of revelers that are curiously moving and exploring AUDIOPOLIS to a soundtrack whose origin is unknown. The inquisitive spectator senses that the orchestration is synchronized with the participants…or are the participants some how controlling the accompaniment? Before s/he can figure it out, an “instigator” explains that s/he could be the one that is controlling the sound through her/his movement and encourages the participant to play. Once the participant realizes that s/he “is the one” that is controlling the sound, a finger taps the participant on the shoulder and a “director” invites her/him to learn more. Climbing up the side of the control tower, the viewer is shown a small, simple USB controller and is invited to take control. The accessible technology allows the newly appointed “operator” to create a soundtrack to the action s/he is witnessing in the Arena. Once the operator’s inspiration is exhausted, s/he climbs down the tower and a new participant is chosen by the Director to be an “operator.”

Some people best enjoy experiencing an event such as SoundWalk on their own. Others, though, may find the whole thing a little daunting to negotiate solo, preferring some direction and explanation of the whole business. To that end, this year a guided tour will be provided. Beginning at 7 p.m. in the gallery attached to Sipology Coffee (448 E. Broadway), local sound stalwart Glenn Bach will lead the tour group through the entire SoundWalk landscape—a landscape that is scaled down this year to make taking in the entire event a bit more manageable.

“Last year it was such a big event that people couldn’t necessarily take it in completely,” says Marco Schindelmann, one of the members of FLOOD, the group responsible for founding and curating SoundWalk. “So this year we thought we’d offer people a little more contemplative experience as a whole, a real chance to spend time with every installation instead of having to rush around to see/hear it all.”

However you approach and enjoy SoundWalk—there’s no right or wrong way—it’s a great atmosphere, as well as being a paragon of those unique Long Beach experiences that make our city special.

SoundWalk 2010 is this Saturday, Oct. 5, from 5:00-10:00pm in the East Village Arts District. For more information, visit soundwalk.org.

Footnotes
¹Yes, that’s the correct way to pluralalize ‘Starbucks.’ Grammatically you gotta keep up with the Joneses.
²Would that make for a good piece? You know, I get comments on this page, but I got this lbpost.com e-mail address ([email protected]) that is way underused, so by all means feel free to contact me directly with feedback, story ideas, etc.
³What’s that you say: you’re not familiar with Burning Man? Well, we can help you with that right here.