We often talk about how one of the effects of a night of Northern Spark is to “see the city in a new light.” Since year 1, there has also been a remarkable range of sound and music projects from Phillip Blackburn’s festival opening Car Horn Fanfare to Monica Haller’s contemplative Can You Listen to the Same River Twice?

2015 is no exception, starting, of course, starting with Adam Levy, And the Professors, and the Mill City Summer Opera at the opening Northern Spark Launch Party (tickets) segueing to Cloud Cult’s outdoor concertpresented with tpt Lowertown Line on the Minneapolis Convention Center Plaza, and ending at dawn with Brian Engel of Hotpants and Hipshaker Minneapolis fame at the Pancake Feed (tickets).

Brian Engel, Greg Waletski, and George Rodriguez constitute a dense portion of the Minneapolis vinyl firmament.

In between are a medley of sounds for the ear:

David Andree, Josh Mason, Jonathan Kaiser, Nathan McLaughlin, John Marks, Casey Deming, and Ryan Potts (Aquarelle), An Overture in Seven Parts, a long-form continuous sound composition that will be created in real time by a collective of seven different artists recording layered accompaniment onto the same pair of asynchronous tape loops.

Charanga Tropical, Dance Party with Charanga Tropical, a nine-piece ensemble featuring musicians from throughout the Americas.

Mary Ellen Childs, Ear and Nose where participants will experience music paired with specific scents.

Dreamland Faces’ live score for Epics of the Toilers: Working Class Silent Films.

D. Mort Eicher, Disco Roller Printing Party: roller-skate to the disco sounds of the 1970s while you experiment with several printmaking techniques.

John Keston with Ai MN students,, Instant Composer: Mad-libbed Music: write compositions at a computer kiosk for an ensemble of improvising musicians.

Miko Simmons, In Ruins

Kathy McTavish, mill city requiem: for solo instrument & distance, a virtual “media orchestra” to receive sine waves, pulsed images, vector sketches, and sounds based on your distance from a live musician.

MN Orchestra String Quartet, From Amber Frozen, entrancing music from composer and DJ, Mason Bates influenced as much by today’s electronica as it is from Indonesian gamelan.

 Richard Mueller & Stefon BIONIK Taylor, You Are Hear: music fills your ears in a three-dimensional space, and as you turn around you can hear and see individual virtual sounds and shapes all around you, some closer and louder, others further away and quieter.

Miko S. Simmons, In Ruins: A History of the Future’s Past, a 3D submersive projected multimedia performance that weaves the audience through a transformative journey into our collective cultural consciousness.

Sumunar musicians, Prince Rama’ s Journey, November 2014. Photo Ray Mailoor Photography.

Sumunar Gamelan and Dance Ensembles, Klenengan – All-Night Gamelan Performance of traditional and contemporary Javanese gamelan music

Voices in the Dark,multiple singing ensembles throughout the night: Magpies & Ravens, Potluck Jams, Artemis, Hymnos,  Academy of Voices, Summer Singers, Elizabethan Syngers, ENCORE!, and Prairie Fire Ladies’ Choir.