Creator and Arranger: Andrea Cockerton
Wrap-around social media, mobile technology, live streaming and 24-hour consumerism mean we now live in a constantly wired world. Our senses, bombarded with information, make it harder to switch off, except perhaps when we sleep. In The Dark, started by Andrea Cockerton in Cambridge in 2017, provides the perfect antidote. This unique live music experience is back in London for the first time in two years and promises to shut out the pesky noise and wrap you in a place of peace, beauty and human connection.
For music lovers, this live concert is like no other. Experienced in complete blackness, every seat has on it a sleep mask, the kind worn for long-haul plane journeys. When you remove it 70 minutes later, you have been on a journey yet remain in the same location. Without vision to steer your understanding, your sense of hearing becomes acutely aware of every cough and chair scrape. As the light diminishes and darkness spreads around the vaulted ceilings and stained glass windows of Saint Bartholomew the Great, the 12th century city church where the London tour kicks off, there’s a frisson of anticipation.
Delivered by a troupe of 30 instrumentalists and vocalists – all in silent socks – no squeaky shoes – selected from the West End, Royal School of Music, Guildhall School of Music and Drama and more, the music is neither amplified nor static. Musicians and vocalists move around the space and audience to create 360 surround sound – but with no speakers involved. Acoustic sounds approach, recede, build and fade. The building is another instrument, a silent partner that lifts, propels and carries the sounds of cello, clarinet, timpani, mandolin and voice.
Is this journey into sound 20 hours or 10 minutes? Behind the mask, time both expands and shrinks. The overall effect of listening to such beautiful music in the dark is like a cleansing of the soul. You hear every vibration in every sound; every lilt and nuance in each voice. Some moments, you feel to be at your own funeral; at others, as though you’re being serenaded into the world at your own birth. Meditative, soothing and elevating, you may be lulled into deep sleep or find your mind racing before it hits a calm spot, ready to receive and absorb the acoustic jewels offered by a symphony of angels whose faces are seen for the first time once the sleep mask comes off.
HUSH includes songs by Sigur Rós, Coldplay, Ólafur Arnaulds and Mumford and Sons. This gentle, soothing arrangement is what In The Dark established their reputation on in 2024. PULSE, the new addition, builds energy with more rhythmic, thrumming reworks of pieces by M83, Nils Frahm, Kate Bush and Jose González. Spanning experimental, ambient, Scandi-folk and classical, these sounds reach out and affect the audience on a cellular, spiritual level. If you go with a partner or friend, you will feel their closeness, and if you go alone, you will feel less alone.
It’s probably not for everyone. Those who suffer from claustrophobia, nyctophobia (fear of the dark), anxiety or hearing impairment may struggle, but if you are happy to enter a place of complete darkness in order to experience something memorable, restorative and elevating, then In The Dark is coming to a Godly place near you. Less work than yoga or meditation, this shortcut to serenity is not to be missed.
Reviewed on 15 September and continues to tour
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