Mount Hope World Singers open ‘The Hundred Windows’

The Mount Hope World Singers describe their current presentation, “The Hundred Windows,” as a “multidisciplinary sensation,” and that description is accurate. This collaboration of MHWS, visual artist and animator Christine Banna of Rochester Institute of Technology, and composer and sound designer Logan Barrett, is nothing if not ambitious: a concert reflecting the vastness of the world we inhabit—in one hour.

The show was inspired by Ed Yong’s book “An Immense World,” which presents the idea of the umwelt, the specific ways in which organisms, human and otherwise, perceive and experience the world through their senses. The notion sparked the imagination of Annika Bentley, a MHWS member and
artistic director, and the show’s creative director and producer.

We can all name the five basic senses of sight, smell, touch, taste, and hearing. But in her reading Bentley also learned about echolocation, electroreception, magnetoreception, nociception (pain), proprioception (self in space), thermoreception (heat/cold), equilibrioception (balance), and extrasensory perception (ESP). This was a revelation to her.

“All creatures live in our own limited bubbles of sensorial experience,” says Bentley. “But the universe is infinite, and keeps throwing wild, beautiful, chaotic information at us through ‘the hundred windows.’ I found this extremely moving, and started thinking of how to present the idea in a show.”

“We’re enclosed in our own houses, our own visual bubbles,” says designer Christine Banna. “We can see and interpret the universe, but we don’t understand it.”

In addition to producing vocal sounds, the 23 singers in the chorus, conducted by Brian White, are complemented by a continuous electronic soundscape “translating the natural world into sound,” in the words of composer Barrett, who also performs it live.

Both Banna and Barrett engage in live mixing of sounds and images during the performances, so that each show is a unique combination of images and music.

The Mount Hope World Singers encourage intercultural understanding by performing music from around the globe. The “Hundred Windows” program comprises choral works from Malaysia, Haiti, South Africa, Norway, Brazil, Ireland, Australia, China, Ecuador, the United States, Canada, and the Ute people, in their original languages. The 12 numbers are programmed to symbolize a life cycle, through birth, life, death, and rebirth, and illustrate aspects of sensory perception.

For example, a popular South African song exploits the echoes of the Xhosa language’s tongue-against-teeth clicking sound, representing “echolocation,” as well as “proprioception” in describing the movements of dung beetles. (Bentley couldn’t find a musical counterpart for “electroreception,” a sense mainly found in South American knifefish that swim in murky water and communicate through electric pulses. So, she wrote a song of her own.)

“All this music represents oral traditions and a universal experience,” says Bentley. “We show the interconnectedness of all people, our essential sameness.”

Banna’s design for the visual presentation is abstract, with an emphasis on circles suggested by the concept of our “visual bubbles.” Banna adds that the different countries are sometimes reflected in the visuals; for example, she discovered in talking with one of her student assistants from Haiti that the Haitian song “Papa Loko” represents a Vodou deity analogous to the Christian Saint Joseph, so she employed green and gold, colors associated with the saint.

“We listened to the songs,” says Banna, “to see what colors came to mind, and went organically from there. There is a continuous flow to the colors in the show; the screen never goes black.”

With its elements of biology, anthropology, ethnomusicology, abstract art, and experimental theater, “The Hundred Windows” may sound like a full college semester crammed into an hour. But the reality is a wonderfully complex and beautiful show that excited its initial audiences in June, and returns later this month for performances at RIT, and at the Jewish Community Center as part of the ESL Rochester Fringe Festival. (See details below.)

The Mount Hope World Singers hope that their “Hundred Windows” will let fresh air blow through the typical concert experience.

“We use some elements of experimental theater,” says Bentley. For example, the “set” is a skeletal frame house, but the singers don’t stay there long, forming groups onstage and sometimes amid the audience.

“We break the fourth wall immediately,” says Bentley. “The ‘plant and deliver’ approach to choral singing can be a barrier between singers and audience. This is an immersive experience.”

Adds Banna: “It is quite avant-garde at times, but the show really is meant to be accessible. Just let the images and the sounds wash all over you.”

The Sept. 15 Fringe Festival performance will be the last for MHWS’ “The Hundred Windows.” (The chorus has made a permanent video record of the show.) Bentley and the chorus will spend the coming year developing a new show, scheduled to open in June 2026.

She adds that as a volunteer, community chorus, the members are sometimes intimidated by the array of musical and performing styles they’re asked to master: complicated polyrhythms (or no rhythms at all), unusual sounds like clicks, many different languages, and for the finale of “The Hundred Windows,” even some Malaysian-inspired dancing.

But they do master them, says Bentley.

“Much of this music is difficult, but with help from our section leaders, we find our way into it,” she says. “This eventually results in a huge level of shared pride. And it’s really fun.

“‘The Hundred Windows’ was a real labor of love,” Bentley adds. “But for all of us, it’s been an extremely rewarding and exciting collaboration.”

The Mount Hope World Singers will perform “The Hundred Windows” on Sept. 13, at 8 p.m. at The SHED at RIT, 11 Lomb Memorial Drive; and Sept. 15, at 6 p.m. at JCC Hart Theater, 1200 Edgewood Avenue, as part of the ESL Rochester Fringe Festival. Details and tickets are available at mounthopeworldsingers.org.

David Raymond is a Rochester Beacon contributing writer.

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