In a city as vibrant as New York, it’s easy to become a little numb to the cacophony. But fourteen years later, I discovered something I had never experienced before: a full concert performed on toy pianos and various curio percussion in a narrow catacomb dug atop a hill in an otherwise silent cemetery in the heart of South Brooklyn.
For almost a decade Groen-Wood Cemetery has organized a series of concerts in the catacomb with 30 vaults. The cemetery was originally built in the 1850s for those who wanted to be buried above ground but could not afford their own mausoleum.
The tunnel itself is rather modest, with no cove carvings apart from a skylight at the far end, with each of the vaults loosely enclosed by its own metal gate and the occasional surname above an entranceway. (One notable decoration was a crest of the Daughters of the American Revolution to the left of an otherwise unmarked entrance.) Walking through today, you can still make out some of the big names above these breakout spaces – Ferguson, Piro and Herrmann. name a few – the rest are otherwise unmarked from the main entrance.
I might have been able to make out more details during the day, but I went into the cemetery long after nightfall to take a look Curiosities in the catacombsa performance piece by avant-garde artist Margaret Leng Tan. When I arrived, Tan and her team were preparing for their second and final show of the evening. The tunnel was engulfed in a purple glow from a scattering of floor lamps, with the exception of the entranceway, which was additionally illuminated by a projection of a vintage clown photo.
There were three makeshift stages in the center of the tunnel, flanked by a total of about fifty seats. Farthest down, just in front of the Piro vault, was a baby grand piano that was at most a few meters high; many of Tan’s toy pianos are custom-made, she told me later. The sense of scale was disorienting, not to mention the location. Eventually, several more toy pianos were released, as well as a wind-up music box, a children’s toy telephone, various masks, and other accessories that I could barely describe, let alone guess how they would be used in the show.
I sat down as the crowd entered, being transported on a trolley from the entrance. After a few minutes of people slowly finding their places, all trying to peek into every vault along the way, the room fell silent and Tan began her performance of Curiosities in the catacombs.
Any description of the performance will not do him much service. But to get close, I suggest you watch this video, and I’ll just say, ‘It’s this, but this, So much more.”
Throughout the 90-minute show, Tan jumped effortlessly between different instruments and ‘instruments’, with every sound-producing device on stage – including the children’s toy telephone – having at least one solo moment. The lyrics were sparse, but always added to the creepiness; one song wrapped around a World War I children’s song about hearses. A particularly catchy/creepy tune called “The Worms Crawl In”… well, I didn’t manage to write down any lyrics, but you can probably guess how it went. My highlight was ‘Rosie’, a musical horror story in four scenes composed by a 10-year-old named Anastasha from Singapore.
Tan’s show would be an excellent opener to the spooky season regardless of location, but in the midst of a crowd of buried bodies that outnumbered the live audience at several points, all enjoying the collective oddity at the same time, it was a true thrill.
The catacomb concerts are closed this year – with the drop in effect, temperatures are dropping far too low for the living. But the point remains, both now and every year afterward: when someone invites you to attend a show at a cemetery, whether it’s orchestral or curious or something else, you say yes.