Ryuichi Sakamoto: async at the Park Avenue Armory

There are eight cameras used, but we still feel motionless. Instead of nervous switching between views, we feel calm. From the moment Ryuichi Sakamoto enters the room, sits at the piano and puts his hands on the keyboard, the "borrowed stage design" in the Veterans Room becomes part of a composition from his album async, as this is its premiere performance, captured in Schible's film. We become sensitized to murmurs, we look intently at the purple blizzard, billowing clouds and rings on the water appearing on the screen above the pianist's head. He alters the interior into an atrium of augmented reality. He plays unusual instruments, striking the piano strings with chopsticks, tapping nearly invisible threads with a mallet and sampling the sounds of a piano knocked out of tune by a tsunami. async is a mature return. The concert both sealed his victory over illness and offered a reflection on passing, including in the world of sounds and clamor. The film about that evening is like a minimalist ceremony during which the listener soaks in the noises as well as the melodies of the passing world. After all, another opportunity to hear them might not come along.