Aeolian Radio

“Aeolian Radio” uses a kinetic pendulum antenna sculpture, vocals, field recordings, and live electronics to produce a wide-ranging exploration of radio frequencies, interference rhythms, and vocal timbres. Through polarity shifts, the pendulum creates an interference rhythm that the artists take as a starting point for developing the work in three sections.

Thrän and Hertz perform alongside and embody these rhythms, vocalizing in consonance and dissonance with it´s signals and static. Successive studio sessions with the sculpture led to the development of a number of custom performance interfaces, through which the voice and antenna meld with, and augment, each other in surprising and generative ways. The term “Aeolian” evokes the classical Aeolian harp — an instrument played by the wind — drawing a parallel between natural wind energy and the invisible electromagnetic winds that “Aeolian Radio” harnesses. This piece asks: what happens when the frequency range we make ourselves sensitive to is expanded to include these more-than-human winds? How do the rhythms of non-human entities interfere with, highlight, amplify, or cancel out our human patterns? “Aeolian Radio” is an experiment that develops as a fever dream where these contrasting rhythms form a dense ecosystem, switching between the natural, the artificial, and the unplaceable.