by Mike Telin
My experience with sound installations is that you never know what to expect. Sometimes the sound adds ambience to — perhaps a walk through an enchanted garden. Other times it’s simply made me feel anxious.
But what is a sound installation? Basically it’s placing a sound system in a room. Yet describing a sound installation becomes a bit more complicated — is it visual art? Is it experimental music? Or is it a combination of both? In the end, does it need to fit into any category? After all, it is about the experience — aural and physical.
By far the most interesting experience I have had with sound was standing inside an organ case while the pipes were being tuned. To feel the dissonances and hear the beats gradually move into a perfect unison is something everyone should experience.
So it was a wonderful surprise to walk into the Pivot Center on June 11 at 11:30 am to be greeted by sound artist Bob Drake, whose installation Dröhnen/Dröna was featured as part of this month’s Re:Sound Festival of New and Experimental Music. Drake showed my colleague and me into a large room bathed in soft shades of blue. On the floor, along the left wall, were two ranks of organ pipes and a traditional pipe organ windchest.
“Creativity is the expression of life, so for me the question is why on earth would you not be creative? Why on earth would you not want to grow?” flutist, composer, improviser, author, teacher, and inventor Robert Dick said during a recent telephone interview. A leader in contemporary flute music, he has redefined the instrument’s musical possibilities. 
“Attending an experimental music concert is almost like a spectacle,” composer and instrumentalist