Art’s Birthday 2009
Safe and Sound
Deutschlandradio Klangkunst live from Maria am Ostbahnhof, Berlin

Electronics, wireless headphones and choreography: Brandon LaBelle & BJ Nilsen

Producer: Marcus Gammel

marcus.gammel.fm@dradio.de
www.dradio.de
www.clubmaria.de

The music will not be broadcast

Brandon LaBelle + Benny Nilsen

Working under the theme of Art's Birthday, the concept of "safe and sound" is explored through the form of a silent disco. Staged at the Maria am Ostbahnhof club in Berlin, The music will not be broadcast usurps the collective pleasures found on the dance floor as the beginning for an enlarged acoustical event where the comforting euphoria of collective mingling is contrasted with the embedded dangers dancing might come to represent. Presented through wireless headphones, an original electronic composition mixing experimental beats, musical samples and found sounds will be played, activating the rhythmical flow of movement as an occupation and contouring of the space. Complementing and intersecting with the headphone work, live amplifications of the event are incorporated back into the composition: locating microphones along the floor and throughout the space, the movements and interactions of the crowd are captured and amplified through a sound system located in the space to generate an additional sonic layer, allowing visitors to hear the sounds of their own dancing and interactions. In this way, a number of elements are put into play weaving together electronic music and the generative experience of dancing with material traces and architectural accents. The dance floor is underscored as a space of fragmentation and immersion while also representing the potential for disruption and excess. Extending this as a live radio broadcast, the work places the body on-air so as to occupy the private space of the listener.

Biographies:

Brandon LaBelle is an artist and writer working with sound and related cultural narratives. His installation work has been featured internationally, including the exhibitions and festivals Sampling Rage (1999) at Podewil Berlin, Sound as Media (2000) at ICC Tokyo, Bitstreams (2001) at the Whitney Museum New York, Pleasure of Language (2002) at the Netherlands Media Art Institute Amsterdam, Undercover (2003) at the Museum of Contempoary Art Roskilde, and as part of Tuned City (2008), a festival on sound and architecture, Berlin. In addition he presented a solo exhibition at Singuhr galerie in Berlin (2004), an experimental composition for pirate drummers at Virtual Territories, Nantes (2005), and his Prototypes for the Mobilization and Broadcast of Fugitive Sound was exhibited at the Enrico Fornello gallery, Prato, in 2007. His ongoing project to build a library of radio memories was presented at Radio Revolten, Halle, Germany in 2006 and at Casa Vecina, Mexico City, in 2008. He is the author of Background Noise: Perspectives on Sound Art (Continuum, 2006) and co-editor of Radio Territories (Errant Bodies Press, 2007). www.errantbodies.org

Benny Nilsen is a sound and recording artist focused primarily on the sound of nature and its effect on humans, and the perception of time and space as experienced through sound. In addition, he has worked for documentary film, television and as a sound engineer. Nilsen regularly performs live around the world and in collaboration with Chris Watson, Stilluppsteypa, Fennesz, Hildur Gudnadottir, Johann Johannsson, Z’ev, Finnbogi Petursson, Darri Lorenzen, Ingolfur Arnarson, amongst others. Recent releases of his work include The Short Night, and Storm with Chris Watson (both on Touch Music), as well as Man From Deep River with Stilluppsteypa (on Editions Mego). www.bjnilsen.com