installation and performance, part of the the group show, „Radio-Aktivität“, Lenbachhaus, Munich, 2020
Listen and purchase the sound piece via bandcamp!
The sound piece „Ports in Transition“ explores the acoustic landscapes of the Mediterranean. A central point of reference is a field recording of ship horns at the port of Piraeus: on Epiphany, the ships make their horns sound at the same time. This field recording is used for sampling and as a source signal for modular synthesizers and translated into a score for a wind quartet.
The piece is set up as an one hour long radio broadcast, which concentrates on the backgrounds and atmospheres of the transmitted areas and of radio transmission noises . Within this process ‚ambient‘ is not considered as a documentation of a certain somewhere or sometime. Instead it creates an individuated, impressionistic and imagined place as a port. It is realized in-between our internal and external selves. Landscapes and atmospheres become conjured places through which the music moves and in which the listener can wander.
Within the sequences in which the sound fades into the background, a space opens up for the participation: In a performative live version of the sound piece, the Lenbachhaus‘s garden is defined as an open field of sending and receiving. Members of the audience can become involved as accomplices of the performance: equipped with instruction manuals and walkie-talkies, they can send signals to a monumental guitar amplifier sculpture and become a formative part of the performance.
Listen to the live recording of the performance at Cashmere Radio.
Commissioned by the Goethe-Institut Athens and the Onassis Foundation, the sound piece premiered at the festival „Movement 1920–2020“ (Onassis Stegi, Athens). The performance is a commission by the Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus Munich.
Performance by
Kalas Liebfried feat. Jonas Yamer and accomplices
Sound piece (recording sessions)
Kalas Liebfried | conception, composition, production, synthesizer
Lobo | production, mixing, mastering
Ralph Heidel | arrangement, alto saxophone, bass clarinet
Jonas Yamer | bass guitar, electronics
Bastien Rieser | trumpet, flugelhorn
Philip Hutter | modular synthesizer system
edition poster (top) in collaboration with Alexander Scharf / Team Hula
credit images: Lenbachhaus, Ernst Jank
KALAS LIEBFRIED 