As you may already know, music is important to me — especially when traveling — and sometimes I will listen to recent music from artists whose heyday was sometime between the 1950s and 1990s to hear what they are doing in the 21st century.
Could This Be The Slowest Song in the World?
When I think of the Isley Brothers, I think of funk and soul — although they achieved success with Motown in their early years with This Old Heart of Mine in 1966 — and when I think of Santana, I think of rock with a Latin twinge.
The Isley Brothers and Santana joined forces to create an album of cover songs back in 2017 called Power of Peace; and one of those songs is called Let The Rain Fall on Me, which was first released in 1969 on the debut album Spirits Known and Unknown by Leon Thomas.
Here are both versions of the song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQDPVDG8Gr4
While hearing what amounts to be a standard of sorts by a collaboration between the Isley Brothers and Santana seems to be rather unusual — given the musical genres for which they are known — I also found both versions of the song to be rather…
…slow — to the point of almost excruciating.
I then wondered to myself what is the slowest song in the world — so I conducted a search and found this article which was written by Allison Meier for Atlas Obscura:
AVANT GARDE COMPOSER JOHN CAGE CRAFTED SOME PRETTY GLACIAL MUSIC, BUT AN ORGAN IN GERMANY IS STRETCHING ONE OF HIS PIECES TO 639 YEARS. The Sankt Burchardi Church Organ in Halberstadt, Germany, started playing “As Slow As Possible” on September 5, 2001, and it will finish in 2640.
John Cage first composed the musical piece back in 1985; but he has since passed away in 1992.
The slowest piece of music does not necessarily mean that it is the longest piece of music, as the aforementioned article referred to Longplayer, which is a composition whose claim is that it is 1,000 years long and has been playing for almost 22 years.
Final Boarding Call
Sankt Burchardi Church is in Halberstadt, which is located approximately 210 kilometers west southwest of Berlin — or roughly halfway between Hanover and Leipzig — in north central Germany.
I have never been to Berlin — but I do know a friend who lives northeast of Berlin; and when I visit him, I intend to take a side trip to Halberstadt and take my time to see the organ which was constructed specifically to play As Slow As Possible.
Photograph ©2015 by Brian Cohen.
