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Walter works at the Exploratorium, and is an all around amazing and  
great guy. He is also a "bird whisperer" and makes beautiful  
photographs of raptors and others who have come to trust him...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kitundu_birds/

Congrats to Walter and the the people who have provided him with  
opportunities to learn and teach.

Eric Siegel

===================================

MacArthur awarded to Walter Kitundu

Sam Whiting, Chronicle Staff Writer

Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Walter Kitundu, the Bay Area's only winner, with his phon...

San Francisco sound artist, instrument builder and composer Walter  
Kitundu, best known for his phonoharp, which makes the common record  
player a stringed instrument, was named a MacArthur Fellow on Monday  
night.

Kitundu, 35, is the only Bay Area recipient of the annual award, which  
comes with a $500,000 grant, funded by the John D. and Catherine T.  
MacArthur Foundation. Kitundu, like the 24 other winners in a variety  
of fields, may use the money as he sees fit. The MacArthur awards are  
shrouded in secrecy and the surest way to not win one is to apply for  
it. Nominees are anonymously submitted by leaders in their field, and  
the only way to know you are up for a MacArthur is when they call to  
say you have won.

In Kitundu's case the call came when he was driving his 1984 Honda to  
the Potrero Hill campus of California College of the Arts, where he is  
the Wornick Distinguished Visiting Professor of Wood Arts. "I couldn't  
respond for several seconds. I had five minutes to digest the news  
before teaching a class for six hours."

Kitundu said he had no plans yet for the money but they didn't involve  
calling in sick. It is hard to find a substitute for a studio  
furniture course that focuses on design that integrates wind, water,  
tides, geologic movement, temperature and animal behaviors. (If you  
are having trouble envisioning that in a chair, Kitundu will lecture  
Oct. 22 at the Potrero Hill campus, an award-winning makeover of the  
old Greyhound bus maintenance facility. For information: (415)  
703-9563).

"I've been making my living thinking up crazy instruments," he said  
Monday from the Headlands Center for the Arts, near Fort Cronkite.  
"It's a privilege. I could be working 16 hours a day in a factory  
somewhere."

It is unknown what got the attention of the MacArthur committee, but  
the phonoharp, which looks like something John Sebastian might sample  
on a reunion tour of the Lovin' Spoonful, is a good bet. It creates a  
sound that combines the gentleness of the plucked strings with an LP  
spun on the turntable, an appealing mixture to the Kronos Quartet, the  
modern classical string band. After hearing Kitundu play the  
phonoharp, the San Francisco quartet hired Kitundu to be the Kronos  
Instrument Builder in residence. Kitundu built an individual phonoharp  
for each member. He also wrote a piece specific to this combination,  
which was performed at the San Francisco Jazz Festival a year ago,  
with Kitundu himself adding a fifth Phonoharp and a little clarinet on  
the side.

"The nearest person I can think of that would give people a sense of  
the breadth of his interests and talent is Leonardo da Vinci," said  
David Harrington, artistic director and founder of the Kronos Quartet,  
reached Monday by phone in London, where the band is touring, without  
its arsenal of phonoharps.

Next, Kitundu is building Kronos a set of four trumpet violins. "As  
far as I know there's not a set of these in the entire country," said  
Harrington, who describes Kitundu as "a wonderful force in life. He  
has so many areas of talent, as a musician and instrument builder, a  
bird watcher. Anything that he comes in contact with that interests  
him, he masters."

Kitundu was born in Rochester, Minn., but spent his first eight years  
in Tanzania before returning to Minnesota. He came to San Francisco 10  
years ago, in December. "Living through 17 Minnesota winters and  
seeing things bloom in December" was incentive enough.

Kitundu lives alone in a rented studio apartment in the Western  
Addition, overcrowded with instruments. His kitchen is a woodshop. He  
has no plans to move "not so far. I don't feel the need to make any  
enormous sweeping changes."

In addition to being Instrument Builder in Residence for Kronos,  
Kitundu is on staff at the Exploratorium as a MultiMedia artist. He is  
also artist in residence at the Headlands Center for the Arts.

Already a new concept is starting to formulate.

"I have a project in mind for Iceland where you make recordings in the  
lava fields," he said. "I'm thinking of making 10-foot diameter  
records and installing them in places where they're likely to be  
covered in lava someday. The goal is to play the resulting stone  
records on 15-foot hand-cranked Victrolas." There is no timetable on  
this turntable.

"I don't make predictions," he said.
Eric Siegel
esiegel at nyscience dot org





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