A stroll not far from the one-time Lexington home of the “great compromiser” could find one in a sound-rich environment. The Henry Clay Estate-Ashland features 20 Sun Boxes, soaking up the rays and emitting scattered tones across the grassy area. Plenty of sun made for plenty of sounds earlier this week. The Sun Box artist is Craig Colorusso, who lives in Arkansas, grew up in Connecticut with a music background. He said each triangular box has a circuit board and amplifier inside. “Inside each box is a different recording of a guitar note. The catch is that all those guitar notes are a different length. And there’s a bit of compositional silence at the end. And so, they’re programmed to play continually as long as they have enough power, which is the sun. And so, as they repeat they line up differently,” said Colorusso. Colorusso said, according to his calculations, it would take more than three months before it would cycle around and start over again, something he calls impossible on this planet. The auditory artist spent some years as part of a punk rock band. While that was enjoyable then, Colorusso yearned to present sound in a different way. “Being in really loud rock bands and feeling like I love being up here on stage but there’s always gonna be that barrier between the audience and the performer and I wanted to create something that didn’t have that. Sun Box is a great example..as soon as you see it or hear it, you decide how far up you want to go, how much you want to participate,” said Colorusso. Stu Johnson Sun Box at Ashland And Colorusso said other sounds around sun boxes, people talking, birds, cars going by, airplanes above are all musical and in tune. Jim Clark is the executive director at Ashland. In an identical role at LexArts, the sun boxes came to Lexington a decade ago and were on the site which is now home to City Center. The soothing nature is the same this week. “They actually refer to this as a ‘sound bath.’ A couple of people this morning said, “I just sort of want to lie down.” I said “go for it.” I think it just sort of has a calming effect,” said Clark. Clark said the entire grounds at the Henry Clay Estate offers mental health benefits. He envisions the owner of the property taking advantage of that well over 200 years ago. “Not too similar to what Henry used to pace up and down these paths that he created…especially after his losses politically….that he would come here rethinks things and get re-energized and head back to D.C.,” said Clark. As far as musical instruments around the home, Clark said piano was prominent and there’s a Martin guitar that Clay’s daughters played. On this day, Jill Angelucci, her daughters Paige and Leah along with Lynn Saphir took in the Ashland experience. Jill said the sounds drew them over to see and hear more. “They’re really neat. We were just walking around and we could hear the noises and we came over and saw they were solar powered and got to talk to the artist to see why he created those and he was telling us his story,” said Angelucci. Stu Johnson Left to Right-Jill Angelucci-Paige Angelucci-Leah Angelucci-Lynn Saphir Seven year old Leah Angelucci first thought the tone were some type of weather warning, but then realized it was art in the making. “I think it’s cool that they make guitar notes instead of just normal notes. They don’t really sound like a guitar. I like how that they are actual notes,” said Angelucci. Leah’s ten year old sister Paige, also uses that word cool to describe the experience with an appreciation of audio art. “I think they’re really cool because it’s using the sun power to power sound and I think it’s cool that he chose sound art instead of like visual that you can see the art,” said Angelucci. And Lynn Saphir said she had a similar thought to Paige, the sounds coming from the 20 boxes on the Ashland lawn amount to a different way of looking at art. The Sun Box display will be open for public viewing and hearing during Ashland hours through Sunday. ** WEKU is working hard to be a leading source for public service, and fact-based journalism. Monthly supporters are the top funding source for this growing nonprofit news organization. Please join others in your community who support WEKU by making your donation. The post Sun Boxes making solar empowered guitar licks at Henry Clay’s Ashland Estate in Lexington appeared first on The Lexington Times.