‘The Great Wallenda’ comprises a sound track of João Penalva whistling the entirety of Igor Stravinsky’s ‘The Rite of Spring’, paired with footage of the last crossing of legendary tightrope walker Karl Wallenda. Known as the Great Wallenda, he died in 1978, at age 73, while attempting a high wire walk between two towers of the Condado Plaza Hotel in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
The sound track was created after regular rehearsals with musician Colin Beynon and recording sessions with sound engineer Tristan Norwell. Penalva does not read music, and his personal documentation of the process, consisting of his notation corresponding to the 153 pages of the music score, as well as photographs of Beyon and Norwell, link the whistled score and images of Wallenda.
‘Like the Great Wallenda, I had to keep my balance. Breathing while, a step at a time, I advanced over the musical line stretched ahead of me; a seemingly endless and dangerous line because unknown. In my montaged version of the Great Wallenda news footage he is seen forever restarting his last stretch after his fatal loss of balance – a chance that, unlike me, he did not have’. João Penalva, October 1998.