From its outward appearance, Audium, a one-of-a-kind theater on San Francisco’s Bush Street, is fairly nondescript. But then again, so is Mary Poppins’ magical carpet bag. Inside both, we get infinite possibilities of imaginative space. Mary’s medium is delight. Audium’s is sound.
As Audium’s David Shaff told KQED in 2022: “There’s 176 speakers, we turn the lights out, you listen for an hour, and hopefully it takes you somewhere.”
For decades, Audium was programmed by David’s father, Stan Shaff, who founded the space with Doug McEachern in 1967 (it moved to its current 49-seat theater in 1975). In 2018, the younger Shaff took the reins, opening the theater up to new composers, new sounds and — in all likelihood — new audiences.
Since 2022, Audium has hosted an annual residency for artists to create new pieces for the theater’s ultra-surround sound system. Audium: New Voices III, opening Feb. 8, is the culmination of the latest residency, featuring live performances of new work from three local sound artists: Roco Córdova, Danishta Rivero and Makana Muanga.
Rivero, an improviser, performer and sound artist, is best known for her solo performances as Caribay and as one half of the electro-acoustic duo Voicehandler. At Audium, Rivero’s “Heretical Voicings” is an attempt to fuse her voice with the building itself. She promises to deliver “a resounding yes with an exclamation mark,” full of bodily sounds like “a scream, a prayer, a burp.”
Córdova’s piece takes a direct look at the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, using their own voice, samples from online media and field recordings from Gaza to create a sonic experience of the war’s ongoing effects.
“I don’t think art should be a place of escape, but a place of confronting and opening conversations,” Córdova says in an Audium video announcing the upcoming show.
Muanga, too, hopes to bring audiences to a place of deeper connection. His composition, “Kukusanyika Pamoja,” includes interviews with family and friends alongside “densely synthesized landscapes.” His performances will begin with a bit of group interaction, to better prepare audience members for a collective pitch-black sonic experience.
“I do really want to see if it’s possible to take a group of strangers, bring them in, give them a shared experience and have them come out a community,” Muanga says.
And with that, Audium’s great sonic experiment continues.
Roco Córdova, Danishta Rivero and Makana Muanga perform live in ‘Audium: New Voices III’ Feb. 8–March 30, 2024 at Audium (1616 Bush St., San Francisco).
