Voicelanding - Exploring the scenographic potential of acoustic sound in site-sensitive performance

Mareike Nele Dobewall

This practical artistic research project explores how the performance of acoustic sound in dialogue with site can create a sonic scenography, experienced by an audience from within the sonic structures. Six art projects were carried out in the context of this research. Their form varies due to the site-sensitive approach that is employed: the space and the participating musicians are both the source and the frame for the resulting spatial sound performances. During workshops the collaborating musicians are introduced to site-sensitive methods. They learn full-body listening, spatial sounding, and space-care. The musicians learn to co-create with the space. In a collaborative process, spatial sound compositions are created using the site-specific sonic material that is elicited from the dialogue between the performers and the space. The relation to the audience plays an important role in the sharing of the performance space and the experience of the sonic scenographies. Therefore, active audience encounter is considered during the creative process towards the performance and it is further explored during each performance. As sound is invisible and ephemeral it is a vulnerable material to engage with when creating scenographies. In this research its instability has revealed itself as an indispensable quality of a scenography that aims to connect the elements of a shared space and make their relations perceivable. There is a tendency to make ‘reliable’ material scenographies and to sustain spatial sound through audio systems while attempting to overcome the challenges a site brings to performance. This approach to performance, scenography, and spatial sound composition, however, limits the relation between acoustic sound and site. In my sonic scenographies the performers are dependent on the dialogue with the space in order to create sonic structures that can be experienced by an audience. The attention needed for this collaboration is space-care. It includes care for all entities in the space, and especially the audience. The ephemeral quality of acoustic sound creates an active sonic scenography that performs together with the musicians, and engages multimodal listening. The resulting spatial sound performance includes the placement and movement of sonic expressions that are specific for each instrument-site relation. In the created performance, as the audience can ‘roam through’ it, they can experience a sonic scenography that unfolds around them. In the interaction of performers and audience in these shared spaces (architectural space and sonic space) a social space can develop that allows for an ephemeral community to emerge.

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Acknowledgements

The development of my artistic research project Voicelanding – Exploring the scenographic potential of acoustic sound in site-sensitive performance required an expansive network of people.

I want to thank my base in Stockholm, Uniarts, for their support during these past four and a half years. Thanks to the research department for their efforts in cultivating an active artistic research environment. I want to especially thank Cecilia Roos for her solution-orientated approach and the profile professors Juliette Mapp, Johanna Garpe, John-Paul Zaccarini, Ellen Røed, Kent Olofsson and Rebecca Hilton for their commitment to opening things up, instead of narrowing them down. A big thanks also goes to Lin-Christin Berentzen, Bodil Lagerås, Camilla Damkjaer, Aila Gengelbach, Sanna Hagström, Sissel Behring and Bo Nordenfelt for helping with the navigation through the institutional network. Thanks to Per Roar Thorsnes, Anne Gry Haugland, Cathy Lane and Kent Olofsson for their valuable feedback as opponents in my percentage seminars. And thanks to my peers for our wide-ranging conversations, for sharing your practices with me, and for listening together.

At the opera department I want to thank my colleagues for interesting conversations, especially my research fellows Tove Dahlberg, Alex Nowitz and Kerstin Perski. Thanks to Jimmy Svensson for the technical support over the years. My gratitude goes to the two prefects during my time at the opera department, Anna Lindal and Lise-Lotte Axelsson, for insisting on practical artistic research in their department.

My biggest thanks go to my first supervisor Wilhelm Carlsson for his trust in my choices when I was unsure, for his gentle guidance and his reliable presence.

Another big thanks goes to my second supervisor Trond Lossius for his open mind and critical thinking.

Each art project has its own group of people without whom I would not have been able to create the artistic work.

For Voiceland I want to thank the choir Hymnodia, the conductor Eyþór Ingi Jónsson, the composer Gísli Jóhann Grétarsson, scenographer Ylva Owren and for documentation Juan Pedro Ponce Bolanos. I want to thank A! festival for their invitation and Hjalteyri for being our space. For the performance in Reykjavik, I want to thank Opera Days Reykjavik for their invitation, especially Guja Sandholt, Árni Ólafur Jónsson and Asa Fanney Gestsdottir. Thanks to Kristinn Brynjólfsson for providing the space Gömlu Kartöflugeymslurnar, Ártúnsbrekku. Additionally, I want to thank the Svensk-isländska samarbetsfonden and the German Embassy in Reykjavik for supporting the performance.

For Vokal-De-Konstruktion my thanks go to my collaboration partner, scenographer Natalia Orendain. Thanks to Colegio de Infantes de la Catedral de Guadalajara and the conductor Aurelio Martínez Coronafor for their openness to this extraordinary process. My gratitude goes also to the parents who made the involvement of the children choir possible through their support. Thanks to Instituto Cultural Cabanas in Guadalajara for giving us the fantastic space. Thanks to A.S. Producciones for the technical support and Beatriz Barragan Horn and Katia Orendain for the documentation. I appreciate the hospitality that I received, especially by Margarita del Castillo. Thanks to the Goethe Institute for supporting this international collaboration.

For Musica Munda my gratitude goes to Juan Pedro Ponce Balanos for organizing the collaboration and for his light design. Thanks to the University of Guadalajara. Thanks to LARVA. I acknowledge the music students Mariana Ruvalcaba Mora, Vania Pamela Arévalo Dávalos, Juan Pablo Martínez Huerta, Miguel Ángel Pulido Rodríguez, Luis Antonio Pano Fuentes, Miguel Jacobo Guzmán Ramírez, Sergio Olivares Montes, Miguel Ernesto Galván del Mora, Édgar Leyva Mercado, Édgar Montoya López for their generous contribution to this project. I want to thank choreographer Karina Suarez Bosche for moving us. My gratitude goes to Annea Lockwood for our inspiring conversations around scores and especially for discussing my experiments with a score for Musica Munda.

For Demmin - letting a city sound I firstly want to thank curator Maria Magdalena Schwaegermann for inviting me to create something in dialogue with the city. Thanks to the members of the Peenechor and their conductor Matthias Wieczorek for their trust and curiosity. Thanks to the people of Demmin for opening up to me. A special thanks goes to Burgi Esch for being the heart of this project. Thanks to Hannes Matthäus for the supportive presence on site and the audio documentation for this project.

For Spaces as Voice Teachers I want to thank KTH and especially Leif Handberg for making it possible for me to work with Reaktorhallen in Stockholm. Thanks to the Kesselhaus Initiative, especially Andreas Kleine. Thanks to my brother Eric for discovering the Kesselhaus space for me. Thanks to Susanne Kautz for exploring the dialogue with the space together with me, and to architect Joerg Kuemmel for exchanging thoughts on my work with Kesselhaus. Thanks to Uniarts Stockholm for granting me the studio for a year, especially to Cecilia Roos for her support in extending my stay in the space for this project.

For Musica Mundana my gratitude goes to Joakim Skog and Katarina Henryson for their commitment to the project even when it became difficult due to the COVID-19 pandemic. I want to thank the participants of the first workshop in 2020. Thanks to Olof Lindvall and Stage&EventLight for a light test day in 2020. Thanks to Leif Handberg for organising the access to Reaktorhallen and to KTH. I want to thank the astrophysicists Donald Kurtz, Kelly Hambleton, Zoltán Kolláth and Lorenz Roth for our interesting conversations. I am also grateful to Kelly Hambleton and Zoltán Kolláth for providing sonifications of real stellar observations of some stars. I am grateful to my brother Jacob for helping me examine the polyphonies of the stars. I want to thank all performers from 2021 for their playfulness and serious approach to my tasks: Karin Brunnsberg, Kelsey Cotton, Lena Gustavsson, Katarina Henryson, Yann Le Nestour, Clara Lindsjö, Magdalena Meitzner, Johan Renman, Adam Roth, Axel Rudolphi, Christian Rutemark, Joakim Skog, Frances Tomazdotter, Ryan Packard. Thanks to Stacey Sacks for preparing the making public event and to Jenni-My Andersson for the technical support and to Helle Zimmerman for the marketing.

Further acknowledgements

To Kerstin Perski for her sharp mind and warm heart

To Stacey Sacks for the laughter, tears and rituals

To Vanja Hamidi Isacson for our adventures and cake

To Lisa Hansson for her free spirit and inquiring mind

To Mara Peiseniece for her joy in playing seriously

To Maria Magdalena Schwaegermann for sharing her vast knowledge with me and her Herzlichkeit.

To Martina Herbig for her reliable companionship, wherever I go

To Ben Speth for our catholic conversations and bountiful playtime

To Josué Moreno for his imagination and our discussions

I am grateful to my family. Thanks to my parents for showing me how to be a gardener, no matter one’s profession. Great appreciation goes to my mother Gitti who actively attends to my endeavours. Thanks also to my big brother Henrik who never tires of introducing me to the scientific perspective on my work, which allows me to expand my own perspective continuously.

In the last phase, when writing my thesis, some people’s support became especially important. Thanks to Lena Nettelbladt for her kindness and for finding all the books I required and Olof Halldin for making sure that all is correct, and nothing forgotten. Thanks to Thomas Pettersson and his team at Taberg Media Group for their advice and the printing of my books. Thanks to Kent Olofsson for his attentive reading and our conversations. Thanks to David Scheutz for his advice with my Research Catalogue exposition. A special thanks goes to David Price for copy-editing my dissertation in a caring way, and for the discussions we had.

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