November 15, 2024, 7:00 pm - 8:30 pm
November 30, 2024 marks the 25th anniversary of the WTO protest in Seattle. Seattle-born composer Chris DeLaurenti presents N30, an hour-long surround sound version of his front-line field recordings made on November 30, 1999. Join in person at Jack Straw, or hear a stereo streaming version via Facebook or YouTube.
The so-called “Battle of Seattle” was not only a protest against corporate attacks on working people and the environment, but a fight for the future waged by the estimated 40,000 protesters who marched through the streets of Seattle.
An oral history made in the moment, N30 is propelled by the audible drama of the unfolding protest teeming with protester chants, stray conversations, and music (notably the Infernal Noise Brigade). In addition, N30 contains a simmering polyglot of police radio traffic, splashes and sprays of tape hiss, enigmatic glossolalia, and other broadcast anomalies.
Earlier incarnations of N30 were aired on Sonarchy produced and hosted by Doug Haire for Jack Straw. The initial surround-sound version of N30 was last heard in Seattle in 2004 at the now-legendary Polestar Music Gallery.
Chris DeLaurenti is a Seattle-born composer, phonographer, music writer, and teacher. He makes field recordings in unusual intersections of acoustic space, sound, and performance. His installations, albums, and performances include N30: Live at the WTO Protest November 30, 1999 (2000) and Favorite Intermissions: Music Before and Between Beethoven Stravinsky Holst (2007) as well as Fit the Description (Ferguson, 9-13 August 2014) (2015), and soft gradient (2024).
Chris holds an MFA from Bard College and a PhD from Goldsmiths, University of London. He has taught ongoing courses at Peabody Institute and The College of William & Mary while leading workshops and residencies at Harvard University, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Duke University, and elsewhere.
