The idea behind our South X Lullaby series was to offer intimate moments with musicians as an antidote to the commotion and deluge that is the SXSW music festival. When we met Lucy Dacus for her Lullaby and found out she'd perform "Historians," a most somber song from her deeply personal and triumphant album Historian, it felt just right. It's a song of reflection, the story of two intertwined partners and the way they document one another's lives and preserve each other's memories.
The setting for this performance, by Lucy Dacus and guitarist Jacob Blizard, is an interactive art installation by the multidisciplinary Israeli artist Ronene Sharabani that's part of the SXSW Art Program. This work, titled "Conductors and Resistance," explores human-machine interaction in our ever-evolving technological world. The images projected behind Lucy and Jacob are two coffee cups, one empty and one that's been almost drained, both tangled in and tugged at by a complex series of wires, representing what I think is human communication and miscommunication.
This is just one of three walls onto which images are projected in this installation — you can see another wall behind Stella Donnelly in her South X Lullaby video, and you can read about Ronen Sharabani's vision for the project here.
Set List
"Historians" Credits
Producers: Bob Boilen, Mito Habe-Evans; Director/Videographer: Nickolai Hammar; Audio Engineer: Josh Rogosin; Photo: Aaron Rogosin for NPR; Executive Producer: Lauren Onkey.
