You know the neighborhood kid who comes to your door and asks you to sponsor him/her in a marathon. You pledge a quarter a lap — a buck if you’re especially generous or confident the kid won’t get far — and you pay up based on how many laps/miles they finished.
Well here’s a pretty cool twist on that concept: How many times can you play the same one-minute piece of music?
The goal: 840 times.
ChamberLab, Tucson’s DIY chamber music composing project, is hosting “Vexations: A Marathon Performance to Benefit the ACLU.” It’s a 16-hour marathon of performances of Erik Satie’s “Vexations” from 8 a.m. to midnight Dec. 2 at Hotel Congress and Maynards Market downtown.
The goal: live up to the French composer’s challenge, outlined at the top of his 1893 score: play it 840 times. Musicians are invited to collect pledges for how many times they can knock out Satie’s “Vexations” during the marathon. At the end of the night, participants’ totals will be tallied and every dime raised will go to the ACLU of Southern Arizona, organizers said.
Interested in the challenge? You can sign up at chamberlab.org/vexations.
ChamberLab also is looking for sponsors and donors to help out with event, which we believe is a first for Tucson.
