July 27, 2025: Ernst Karel- "Atmospheric Rivers" (West Oakland Sound Series)

ERNST KAREL presents his multichannel, ongoing iterative work, Atmospheric Rivers. This piece’s subject is a key component of the global water cycle: the enormous streams of concentrated water vapor which flow through the sky from the tropics towards the poles, releasing heavy rain in high wind, particularly in the western U.S, and anticipated to increase in frequency and intensity with climate change. Performed in surround sound, the piece consists of unprocessed stereo and multichannel location recordings of atmospheric rivers, made over the past few years, as they pass by our house at the rocky northern California coast.