I too only heard of this performance because it was mandatory for my class. Imagine how small the audience would have been if an entire class wasn’t required to attend! I definitely think many U of M students would’ve enjoyed this experience, and that UMS did not do a good job advertising it. My music major friend did hear about this performance through the music school, but I don’t think the general population knows about the awesome performances UMS puts on! Although, in their defense, it is difficult to advertise something that is so audio/visual heavy.

The first words I said after watching Ryoji Ikeda’s Superposition was “…..What did I just watch…”

Maybe it was the spirit of Halloween weekend, but the very beginning of the performance scared me. It sounded like the soundtrack to a horror movie. The sudden bursts of white light and static were very jump-scare-esque. As the performance progressed, I couldn’t help but notice its similarity to EDM (electronic dance music) and their well known concerts. They had the flashing lights and the build, pause, and drop structure of most EDM. But since the sounds created by Ikeda were all found naturally in the world, it made me think of it as an almost “organic brand” of music. And since the performance definitely had a science fiction quality to it. I wouldn’t doubt it if, in the future, this “organic” EDM like music was a genre. However, I did notice the male actor tapping his foot to a steady rhythm, so maybe the sounds created by the Morse code was not entirely “organic” but manipulated.
The bass was also very good at the Power Center. I was sitting in the balcony in the far left and could still feel the vibrations deep inside my bones. In one of my classes, we have been discussing why people pay huge amounts of money to watch a performance versus watch a recording on Youtube for free. If I watched a recording of “Superposition”, I would definitely have missed out on the all lights and images that filled the entire auditorium and the vibrations of the music. I think people go pay money for live concerts to “vibe-out”, or literally feel the vibrations from the music and attitudes of the venue/other people.