THE RIDGEWOOD SICK CENTER TRANSCRIPT
by anna rg
A list of sounds I wish I heard from my window, when I was sickest :
a list of sounds :
a score :
a score of sounds I wish to hear from my window, when I was sickest :
I am sickest :
a score for Weston :
[Weston’s voice is deep and quiet]
May 12, 2022, Madison Street, Ridgewood, Queens
1. Floating spacious round scraps of a melody
2. Slow gentle foghorn tones
3. Sounds of the city transforming for a moment into music.
Performer stands, or sits, below the window of the sick person. The sick person lays in bed, with the window open.
[the sounds of Weston’s playing,
low gentle foghorn tones
scraps of melody
cars zoom by
bus doors hiss, open and close
trucks rumble in the distance
the M train clatters
a body, turns in bed,
sheets rustling.]
[a bird
a car horn
deep blare of a passing dump truck
a brass horn]
[Narrator]
Weston packs their trombone, and the patient drifts into sleep
[trombone echos
layers upon itself]
Weston heads down Madison, trombone case in hand, red jacket slung across their arm, warm spring day. Across Myrtle Avenue, halfway down the block—
unassuming glass door, small emblem of a red tree—you might have passed it.
[birds and passing cars
and a chorus of trombones
wavering shimmering]
A poem inscribed above the door
[an older woman’s voice,
NYC Dominican accent]
[Gloria]
“SOUNDS TO KEEP YOU COMPANY
SOUNDS TO HOLD PAIN
SOUNDS FOR SOLACE
TIL THE KINGDOM OF THE SICK
SHALL RISE AGAIN”
[Narrator]
Weston slips inside.
_________________________________
[door opens,
jingle of a bell, door closes,
the street sounds end abruptly :
bubbling cacophony, phones ringing,
a sea of receptionists, overlapping voices ]
*RING RING*
[clear crisp voice]
Hi this is Lauren,
Thank you for calling the Ridgewood Sick Center—
Hello – oh,
yes.
Oo—
I’m so sorry—
so, if you can —
What else?
ok .
Let’s see what we can send — I can read you a few options?
A violin?
— there’s a beautiful group of bed sonatas by Ileana Solano —
*RING RING*
[soft gentle voice]
Hello…yes... fog again?
Tell me. Ok— lonely — what sort of loneliness?
— intense
We can send you something strong.
–consuming…
of course, no, nothing saccharine, I understand
— dark
like a dark low rumbling sound—
Something to hit the darkest parts. . I’ll make a special note of it.
[Gloria]
Maria, did you get this message?
Suzana - our deaf neighbor— the lady on Himrod Street, by the park —
[voice on the phone]
Or— did you have something in mind?
ah ok, softer
and would you prefer the song by your bed,
or through your
—window, ok, great, yes … second floor?
ok, Eddi should be on her way within the hour.
*RING RING*
[tender voice]
Hola ? gracias a llamar al Centro De Enfermos—
soy Rose, como puedo ayudarle?
— ah, ok bueno
— y cuales son sus síntomas, hoy?
— dolor como un tormenta, oh —
oh, un viento interminable, ah.
quieres un canción muy fuerte — o dulce ?
ok claro, y — creo que C. Lavender Suarez sería muy buena — ella trae un toque delicado
[Gloria]
She’d like another visit, she was wondering if the vibrations could be even lower than they were last time?
Maybe Luke could do it? Can we try to send him out to her?
Later this afternoon?
*RING RING*
_________________________________
[Narrator]
The woman walking slowly closer, you know it’s Gloria, somehow. She has deep red hair, and a smile.
[Gloria]
Welcome again.
[an elder Dominican New Yorker, her voice is reverent, quiet, sure]
Can I — take your hand, for a second?
I would like to —
meet in a moment of silence —
Softly, she holds your arm, for a moment.
— that you may get and receive what you are looking for, today.
I’ll take care of you.
[Narrator]
The requests and wishes are logged onto blue slips of paper which float down the hall, to a room full of waiting keeners —
[a dreamy, warping
landscape of trombones]
[Workers]
ALL THE WORKERS HERE AT THE SICK CENTER ARE SICK
OR WERE SICK, OR WILL BE
WE WORK SHIFTS
WE WORK WHEN WE CAN
WE WORK IN OUR NEIGHBORHOODS.
I WORK WHEN SHE NEEDS TO LIE DOWN.
IT IS ALWAYS FLEXIBLE
DEPENDING ON YOUR WEATHER THAT DAY
IT IS ALWAYS FLEXIBLE
WE ARE PAID EITHER WAY
YOU SHOULD SEE THE ROOM FOR REST AROUND THE CORNER
[Gloria]
This particular outpost of Sick Center has been open for 80 years — actually, 64 years in this location. But it all feels much older. Our guild is a thousand years old — A long glorious age, started during the days of the first sick kingdoms.
[Narrator]
There is a small tree emblem embroidered on the back of Weston’s jacket, of Eddy’s long cloak, of Luke’s hat. They tuck the slips into their cases and lift their instruments and head back out into the neighborhood to the homes of people who cannot leave their beds today.
[Gloria]
We visit everyone, one day or another
[Narrator]
We fall into a large room, Gloria by our side.
[Gloria]
Here, the library! Come.
[Kate]
Past the shelves of braille editions… Wherever your body is going, someone else has been there.
[Narrator]
Books from all kinds of bodies, and the shelves go on and on and so you follow Kate, the librarian, who walks with a yellow cane.
[Kate]
Past this section of scores by sick composers, music for stomach syndromes - (oh yeah, I need that one) - Oh, here we are — I think you might need something form this section.
[Narrator]
Kate makes tall stack for you, variously leatherbound, illustrated, handwritten, hand-made, handbound, crisp, dry, academic, juicy, full of tears—
[Kate]
GUIDE TO PRACTICING WITH FATIGUE : SCALES FOR A TIRED BODY
DIAPHRAGMATIC SINGING FOR THE HORIZONTAL SINGER — love this one
RECORDING FOR CHRONIC FATIGUE, a guide to adaptations and techniques for sick studio work and at home set ups.
VIOLIN AND YOUR POST-EXERTIONAL MALAISE
Oh, and this series ! DEEP LISTENING FOR HOSPITALS, an oral history.
And DEEP LISTENING FOR BEDROOMS, I like them in a little pair. They have some beautiful exercises, actually, in them — “redefining presentness while in a fog”
Now, if you want some more historical music — ah yeah, this one is incredible —
SILENT SINGING : SONGS AND LUNG DISORDERS AND THE HISTORY OF TUBERCULOSIS AVANT GARDE CHOIRS,
THE SHOW DOESN’T HAVE TO GO ON :Resting and resisting for musicians
LONG DISTANCE HARMONY : This is an old one, has a beautiful pale blue cover, leather, sets of embossed patterns on the front – made by a group of sick singers in New York and California, late 1880s– it’s inspired many updated editions – ah here’s the most recent, this one in zine form, with a sort of map of beds and little threads connecting them, printed in white on a bright green cover —
[Narrator]
Gloria beckons to a nook in the library, climbs into a round reddish domed room, which quickly fills with sound.
[Gloria]
This is all the sounds of sick music! Hildegarde of Bingen—
[four high register female voices sing in unison, in Latin, following the path of an austerely beautiful and somehow geometric feeling melody, in a large echoey room, perhaps a church]
Hildegarde, who led us, Hildegarde who planted the seeds for 1000 years of innovations in migraine music —
[cutting in — joyful, vigorous, rhythmic singing in Igbo. A group of high female voices sing a refrain, then joined by low bass voices]
Ikoli Harcourt Whyte! Holding the threads for awhile in Nigeria, in the 30s, following one line of ancient Leprosy Music —
[cutting in— rich vinyl sounds, a hypnotic repeating rhythm, singing on a loop, “eyy johnny greene” violins and a tight drum beat]
J Dilla ! a pioneer of electronic hospital records. At Cedars Sinai ! He reinvented the whole genre
[from a distance, the cloud of dreamy trombone chords reemerges and settles around us]
[Narrator]
An archivist appears, elegant and precise, in a long cloak, and we burrow into another room -
[Archivist, authoritatively in a crisp Kenyan accent]
Ah, here—we are listening to Sounds in Glass Porches
[a scratchy 78 record, the faint tinkle of bells, a warbling drone]
— made in the early 1910s, from one of the Saranac Lake Tuberculosis Groups. . The glass porches were built specifically for those with tuberculosis (but there’s a department on the third floor, if you want to learn about developments for sick architecture).
What happens you relieve the burdens of isolation, of seeking care, seeking food, a safe place to rest — made for such ideal conditions for sick creation-- Those who could make their way to the lake, they produced a beautiful body of work, slowly building on each other’s ideas, finishing each others work when needed
[She rustles through papers]
Here’s the first draft of a sick song that Adelaide developed — inspired generations of sick songwriters – it’s called Trapped, by Adelaide Crapsey.
[her reading turns into singing, soft and faint]
Well and
If day on day
Follows, and weary year
On year. . and ever days and years. .
Well?
But of course, some of their most influential work is here, in these notes passed between sick beds -
[rustling paper. Two distant voices, soft full with conviction]
May 2, 1912, Dear M, we must continue with our trials of silent singing, when we can next find the energy.
Dear J – to move down the same lines of melody together, to be chanting the words in our minds at the same time - this is real singing.
Dear M- music need not have sound. we can raise our voices even as we rest our lungs.
J– the music is in the space of our attention together, the sound is heard in our minds, the creation of a different sort of silence.”
[Archivist]
This was of course, very influential to later un-sick avant garde thinkers—
[Narrator]
We fall into another room, a work room, lines of tools, and piles of scrap wood, bins of metal and wire. A luthier in brightly colored overalls sits and laughs at a workbench, over a mess of strings—
[Luthier, their voice is bubbly, exuberant,excitable]
Hey ! Back here! I’m repairing a bedharp — this is an old one.
[plucks strings, reverberant, deep, extremely out of tune]
We used to make our own here — in the ’40s. Was popular when the neighborhood was mostly Polish — rare to get one in here these days … THIS IS A BEAUTY !! Family heirloom, guess they pass it around, depending on who’s sick in the family….
Let’s see– We’ve got a lot of stuff in here, for repairs — Over here, a really cool pair of bedside steel drums and headboards —
[pom, pom, pom of a steel drum]
Had a horizontal viola from the 1850s last week, really bad shape — decided to ship it to Cremona, Italy — sick center there are the real experts on those, still tinkering trying to replicate Stradivarius’ ones.
Different Sick Centers have specialties, you know — like this group in Lima are developing new repertoires and mouthpieces for shell trumpets, for chronic fatigue. Toronto’s been working on some more electronic pleasure instruments — sound makers, massagers, vibrators, all in one !
[delighted squeals and giggles]
Last year, I spent some time studying over in LA, with a group really focused on continuing the legacy of J Dilla’s hospital recording set up — you know, further developing, following his innovations, bringing it to other hospitals, updating it, you know —
Honestly, most of us have been working on fever instruments this year— the pandemic. Lots of new citizens. Here’s an antique one from Baltimore —1941 — red velvet case — beautiful — still works, used by lupus patients at the hospital — but been making a lot of the new models, lots to lend out, lots of need, lots of sorts of fevers to adjust for. Like these ones, fuzzy to the touch. That was from a group of long covid folk in Crown Heights.
We have music teachers too . If you want to adapt to the instrument you already played, once you became sick. We will send you one to your home. Along with the instrument.
[Cloud of swirling trombones]
[Narrator]
Down a long hall, lined with beds and benches, people lay and lounge and whisper together or stare at the paintings on the ceilings
[soft voices in a large echoing passage]
Down the long hall, pass a room of keeners-in training, practicing a fever piece –
[strains of flutes and violins and voices vibrate]
A room of neighbors, watching a film together, on chants and healing scrolls from the first Sick Kingdoms
[a woman’s ornamented singing in Amharic, blaring from a television]
We pass the keeners lounge, and Gloria stops off to lead a session of her caring hands training.nDown the long hall, a classroom filled with musicians, retraining
[in a lecture hall, a professor speaks, voice reserved and intellectual]
Welcome to “LIMITATIONS: CHANGING BODIES, AGING BODIES AND NEW GENRES, PREPARING FOR DISABLED MUSIC PRACTICES. So. This class is meant to be a combination of repertoire and techniques, exploring this transition ... ok.. We’ll start today with the diagram on page 5 … yes – “How fatigue can reframe ableist traditions of practicing”
Down the long hall, a row of practice rooms:
An old woman, resting on a sofa, shows a mourning song to a young one,
[fragment of a delicate wordless ornamental song, slowly recited]
a mariachi band rehearses new music for a funeral,
[trumpets and violins swirl to make room for a voice]
a teenage punk band tries out their newly written protest song.
[guitar, electronics, young female voices fuzzy through a crappy microphone
DON’T ASK ME IF I’M BETTER
DON’T ASK ME IF I’M BETTER
DON’T ASK ME IF I’M BETTER]
We pass a quiet room, where a group of students tinker with a new sound installation, for the hospital,
in another, an architect finishes the plans for a bed theater renovation, waiting for the coming of the second SICK KINGDOM
the audio play featured the voices of
Anna RG
WestonOlenecki
Lucia Reissig
Lauren Tosswill
Holly MacDonald
Leticia Ayala
Kaeley Pruitt-Hamm
Nyokabi Kariuki
Una Osato
Jenna Bitar
Mel Stancato
Daniel Neumann (who also mixed it)
thanks to Kyla Rose Smith
ALL THE WORKERS ARE SICK
OR WERE SICK OR WILL BE