Songs for Lines/Songs for Waves

1977 · 39 min · Music

This performance consists of ten songs in which music, language and images are equally important. In most of these songs, Anderson plays the violin, accompanied by her own singing and an audiotape (with spoken text, more singing or more violin music). Her songs are often combined with a film projection: she is framed by the light from the projection, and is playing with the shadows cast by her body and her violin. Anderson makes experimental music, and she often find solutions in technological inventions, as with the song 'a man, a woman, a house and a tree'. The music for this piece is created with the help of a ‘slow-scan’ machine, which registers visual information and transforms this into sound. These experiments are not only about music, but also abou language: anagrams, play on words and poetic stories. The introductory anecdotes that Anderson tells are just as important as the song itself.

Directed by Laurie Anderson · Written by Laurie Anderson