“The Whale Listening Project” is a three-day celebration commemorating the 50th anniversary of the multi-platinum recording, “Songs of the Humpback Whale.”

Thursday, April 15 Postponed
4:30-6:00pm | Keynote: Dr. Roger Payne and Katy Payne
(Lecture Hall, Johnson Museum of Art)

The long and haunting songs of humpback whales changed history 50 years ago through the release of a recording: “Songs of the Humpback Whale.” Hearing the voices of these animals affected audiences, stimulating the “Save the Whales” movement — spearheaded by Roger Payne — to regulate and partially close the global whaling industry, and to raise interest in whales among artists and musicians. It also stimulated whale song studies which have continued ever since on breeding grounds in all oceans, as we’ve learned that whales are improvisational composers, whose communal song rapidly changes in every breeding season and thus is always unique both to time and place. All of this has recently become of great interest to the musical community.

Roger will present the discovery that whales sing and some of the events that revealed the social and political impact on people in several nations.  Katy will present some of the Paynes’ findings about the whales’ ever-changing songs, recorded by themselves and others over two decades in the North Atlantic and North Pacific oceans.

Friday, April 16 Postponed
8pm | Premiere of “Kohala Coast, February 2019”
(Sage Chapel)

Experience an immersive soundscape of humpback whale song designed for Sage Chapel by Annie Lewandowski, Kevin Ernste, Bill McQuay, and Kent Hubbell. Post-concert talkback with Chris Gabriele and Dr. Adam Frankel from the Hawaii Marine Mammal Consortium, Katy Payne, and Annie Lewandowski.

Saturday, April 17 Postponed
10:30am-Noon | Whale Song: A Workshop
(Sage Chapel)

Katy Payne and Daniela Gesundheit facilitate an environment within which a primary experience of the compositional techniques and structures at play in humpback whale song can emerge. Together, we will employ leaderless collaboration and experimentation to examine and illuminate the vocalizations of one of the world’s largest living mammals, and to see what we might discover about group identity, distance, competition, innovation, and empathy in the process. All singers, all voices, welcome.