The Sound of Tides
ALYSON FLETCHER
An inter-disciplinary team of young landscape architects , planners , urban designers , advocates and public artists developed the idea for Tidraphone as part of the City of Boston ’ s 2014 Public Space Invitational , hosted by the Mayor ’ s
Office of New Urban Mechanics , and for the annual Fort Point Channel
Watersheet Activation Grant .
Tidraphone , a tidal vibraphone , invites Bostonians to interact with the water and consider our relationship to it , via a playful musical experience that is dynamically affected by the daily tides . Perched on the Congress Street bridge in Boston ’ s Fort Point Channel , the pipes of Tidraphone extend into the water at various lengths . Passersby are invited to play the pipes with mallets . At each moment of the day , the resulting music will be different , because the instrument will resonate in response to the level of the tide . The pitch and tone are dependent on the degree to which the pipes are submerged by the tides . The melodies of tidal variations within the span of a day are a reflection of the range of sea levels that might be experienced with future climate change .
In their climate reports for Boston Harbor , scientists are reluctant to report exactly how much the sea level will rise and when . Visual designs related to climate change can feel limited and didactic . Tidraphone uses the ambiguity and temporal nature of sound to reveal our evolving understanding of sea change , and a musical instrument is a fun and participatory addition to Boston ’ s public space , offering exciting opportunities for programming and educational events related to climate , engineering , music , and ecology .
84 BSLA