It is an artistic creation falling somewhere in the space-time continuum between traditional planetarium show and trippy electronic dance music performance.
On March 24, one day before the show was to begin a twice-daily stint in the Nathan and Fannye Shafran Planetarium at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, Las Vegas-based musician John Allen performed “Stardust: An Immersive Music Experience” for members of the media and other invited guests.
“The groundbreaking experience combines a live, improvised score paired with stunning 360-degree space footage, transporting audiences on a visual and auditory journey from the surface of the Sun to the barren wastelands of Neptune, and the farthest reaches of time and space,” reads a news release from the museum, which late last year completed a years-long grand transformation.
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Furthermore, the release states — and Allen demonstrated — that every show is improvised and thus unique.
He is a one-man band, working a rig that allows him to create and loop bits of music and modulate his voice to generate sounds akin to a powerful electric guitar, deep bass and booming drums.
“What I’ve been able to do is customize it,” he says of his setup, comparing his creative process to that of a painter with paint, a brush and a canvas.
Above him, a stream of stitched-together images consumes the planetarium’s domed display — visuals that range, seemingly, from actual images of space to graphic renderings of the cosmos to imagery inspired by science fiction.
Allen — who after graduating from college played piano and trumpet, performing music ranging from “The Phantom of the Opera” to “Brick House," something he could take doing for only so long — spent about two years creating the show, which is preceded by footage from NASA and facts connected to space.
“That was 16 hours a day for four months,” he says of the show’s prologue. “The research, all the editing… those are all choices that I made — and I wore out a couple of computers in the process.”
His costume — highlighted by a silver jacket and sneakers — is inspired by the spacesuits worn by the astronauts of NASA’s Project Mercury of the early 1960s.
“They’re dressed like baked potatoes,” he says. “I love that aesthetic of the Mercury program.”
He has performed the show at various spots around the country, including Las Vegas — where he has a grand vision of producing it at the Sphere, the much-talked-about high-tech concert venue that has hosted residencies by U2 and other high-profile acts.
The genesis of “Stardust,” he says, was opening his home a few years to a friend going through a divorce and looking for a peaceful place to complete some of the required paperwork. She told him she didn’t mind if he kept practicing music, and he proceeded to noodle with a soundscape for what he thought was, at most, half an hour.
“I look up, and she’s just like … (her) eyes are completely glazed-over,” he says. “She’s like, ‘Oh man — I feel so much better now. Like, I’m not stressed out anymore.’ I was like, ‘Yeah, a little 20-minute ditty.’ She’s like, ‘You don’t realize how long you were playing.’ I was like, ‘What?’ She’s like, ‘That was two hours.’”
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If nothing else, “Stardust” certainly is a showcase for the planetarium’s technical capabilities. As part of the museum’s aforementioned multiphase overhaul, the venue now boasts a “40-foot-diameter seamless dome, a 6.5K resolution projection system, an advanced 5.1 audio system, upgraded cove lighting and cutting-edge Digistar 7 software,” according to the museum’s website. There were moments when Allen cranked up the sound — the EDM and rock phases of the performance — before bringing things to a blissful close.
He says “Stardust” is broken into five movements, the final one intended, in its nonverbal way, to ask a grand question.
“Where does science end and spirituality begin?”
Learn more about John Allen at his website, JustAlliance.com.
‘Stardust: An Immersive Music Experience’
Where: Nathan and Fannye Shafran Planetarium at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, One Wade Oval Drive.
When: 1 and 5 p.m. through March 30.
Tickets: 1 p.m. show, $30; 5 p.m. show, $40, with optional post-show meet-and-greet for an additional $15.
Info: CMNH.org or 216-231-4600.
