From the first note our tour guide sings across the Buffalo Bayou Park Cistern, we know we’re in for something special. Here we are, a group of strangers, standing underground within a reservoir about the size of a city block, struck silent by Rosemarie Croll’s song, “The Cistern Is.” When she’s done, her voice floats over the water. The closing tones ring for 17 seconds as the sound echoes between the calm pool and the cistern’s 221 concrete columns. No one moves. One woman pulls out tissues.
With its otherworldly acoustics, Buffalo Bayou Park Cistern inspires many such moments of collective effervescence, the sensation of well-being sparked by a powerful shared activity. The underground cavern, an industrial relic located on the edge of downtown Houston, may seem like
