After Dark: Life Cycle
Celebrate the journey of life at After Dark through stunning artworks and performances. Prepare to be mesmerized by Elderflora, Majel Connery’s powerful song cycle about a tree’s existence from seedling to log, contrasting and comparing it to a human’s life cycle. Then engage with the awesome natural phenomena all around you through our 700+ interactive exhibits, including chicken embryos in development and scavenger bugs that feed on carcasses.
With Majel Connery
Told from the perspective of a tree itself, Elderflora (“old trees”) follows a tree’s life from tiny seedling, to towering megaflora, to decaying nurse log on the ground.
Written by composer and vocalist Majel Connery, this song cycle is a journey through a technicolor space of layered soundscapes, disembodied vocals, and electric cello (played by Felix Fan). Accompanying the music is a series of vivid tree portraits by time lapse photographer Noah Kalina. Rich in scientific detail, Elderflora is designed to seamlessly restart at the one-hour mark, using music to evoke a portrait of the tree at significant moments in its life.
Majel Connery is a composer, performer, podcaster, and musicologist. Her music has appeared on Radiolab, Kennedy Center Live, and New Sounds. She is the host and producer of A Music of Their Own, an interview podcast on NPR about women in the music industry. She appears onstage as a solo artist, and with NYC-based art rock band, Sky Creature.
