From one drop, an ocean!

Play this interactive meditation at your next gathering, large or small, with your friends or family, or at your next party, and give gratitude for water!

A meditative immersive audience participation sound installation for any number of cell phones by Paul Rudy commissioned by the UMKC Conservatory for Crescendo, November 3, 2023. with generous support from Dr. Elizabeth Noble

These sounds were collected all over the world at places where water touched my heart. Water is one of the richest sounds I know, and it has been my greatest teacher. Some of the water on our planet is older than Mother Earth herself, and even our sun. It seeded life here from the stars amidst the expanse of which we are but a spec. Its wisdom follows a path of least resistance: sometimes gentle and at other times raging! From one drop, an ocean begins with splashes in the Missouri River, and travels to Rome where a fountain trickles in an evening cortile. It flows through creeks in the desert southwest and Appalachia, and to the Alps. It floats up on beaches in the Northwest USA and Italy, and finally crashes onto a beach in Maui. Imagine yourself as a raindrop, visiting your favorite places, joining with other raindrops to create one of the most patient, powerful and life-giving substances on earth. Water is life, and without it, this pale blue dot we call home becomes ashes and dust. Join in this water current to hear what water has to say to you and bathe in the sounds life itself as your drop becomes an ocean!

Thanks to UMKC Conservatory Dean Courtney Crappell for supporting the vision of this work, and to Tom Mardikes for the use of his 40 channel Sound Mandala to test it along the way.