SUSTAIN!
21 – 23 June 2009
Part of the City of London Festival 2009, Sustain! is a three-day programme of music and ideas on the theme of sustainability, curated by John Harle – musician and founder-director of Sospiro, working with Festival Director, Ian Ritchie.
Sustain! is a creative response to the potentially devastating consequences of economic and environmental climate change, and both brought on by human action and inaction. These are among the most urgent and important issues which we are required to face. In times of global change, imagination is a prized asset – to search for new ways of thinking, behaving and leading.
Sustain! brings together people in the vanguard of thought and action who share a common aim – to find these new ways and prepare us for the journey though the years ahead.
THE LEVIATHAN - JOHN HARLE
21st June 2009
The epic event of Sustain!, The Leviathan is a work of living, monumental art, starting at 12 noon on the 21st June - the day of the Summer Solstice.
If you are a saxophonist, you can be a part of this event by emailing us at saxophone@colf.org to register, then return to this site to download your score.
800 saxophonists parade through the streets of the Square Mile, in a pythonic, overwhelming procession, then congregate on London Bridge (It’s the 800th anniversary of the first stone bridge this year), finally dispersing into Southwark, on the south side of the Thames.
The Leviathan, in mythology, is a dragon-like sea creature that represents chaos and disorder, and the symbolism of Harle's Leviathan is the taming of the forces of chaos by concerted, unanimous effort.
The dragons that defend the City of London on its coat of arms, with the motto "Domine dirige nos" ('Lord, guide us'), have morphed into a huge Leviathan, and brought the City to its knees.
The Chaos of the Leviathan is represented by a huge musical dissonance, created by four separate strands in different musical keys.
The Song of the Leviathan, played as the procession sweeps over London Bridge, is the centrepiece of the event. This is the moment of transformation - from an unearthly din, to a harmony arising from the will of so many people. The Leviathan tamed.
As they process southwards, and into Southwark, all the saxophonists settle onto one note, C, to signify unity of action and a tranquility regained.
The Leviathan is an event that also displays the power of music to transform itself from chaos to order, then to unity of action.
Music holds, within itself, the energy to persuade and to alter mood, and we hope the musical metaphor of chaos to order and then to unity will transform the mood of the times.
Only a towering musical gesture can confront the scale of the forces of chaos now unleashed in the City, and The Leviathan is exactly that.
The Leviathan is an Ode to the City of London, as it confronts the unleashed forces of chaos in its recent past.
Our ambition is that The Leviathan will be an event that will purge the city of its crisis of confidence and begin a mood-change - to a positive outlook.
The Leviathan is taking place on the day of the Summer Solstice - a day of renewal, the beginning of a new cycle - perhaps even a Renaissance?
