A naked, vibrating light bulb coil creates a sound. This installation is as simple as that.
The exhibit space was divided into two. One was the Day Room into which daylight poured, the other pitch black. I didn't really understand the Day Room, but the dark one was had beautiful electric coils set up, and they gave off a frizzling sound. Light bulbs placed in high positions had a high pitch, the ones on the ground had a low one.

Once you step into the dark room and look into the soft light, you are hit by an exotic feeling, like you have just traveled back in time to the ancient Tigris-Euphrates Civilization. Then, sitting in a slightly hard sofa, the bulbs don't just make noise, they begin to play music. This is quite Arabian. By just hanging naked light bulbs in a dark room, the space turns from shabby to cosmic. And sometimes a certain melancholy, like an old street lamp, hangs in the air. The experience is of the light bulb's multifaceted expressiveness.

The team that created this installation, artificial, has been displaying their light bulb works for a while now. Of the 100 or so light bulbs that they found and purchased in a market, perhaps 80 have been used already. With only a few left, after seeing these images, you may want to become French! Check out their website and hurry to an exhibition!

artificiel's Site
http://www.artificiel.org/

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On a silver platform sits an unremarkable mass-produced looking piece of equipment. What looks like an amplifier or maybe a CD player at first glance is actually a G-Player. It's function is no different from an ordinary record or CD player in that it is used to listen to sounds. Put what is played back on the G-Player is not a record or CD, it is the Earth. It's slogan: "The Earth is a disk. The Earth is a record."

A geographical database made up of data from cities, the undulation of mountain ranges and the orbit of an artificial satellite as it circles the Earth are all calculated to produce the Sound of the Earth. What you really hear though is the noise of an enormous amount of data being loaded. But it sounded so much like what the Earth should sound like that it gave me the chills.

Like tuning a radio, if you turn the knob on the player, you can "tune" in to some 1000 satellites - geographical satellites, military satellites... the player has a number of genres to choose from. The satellite's name, present longitude and latitude, and its distance from the earth are displayed. Looking at the longitude and latitude, you can see that the satellites are continually moving, and as it moves the subtle changes that you hear really does sound like the scratches of the earth. The noise produced by cities and mountain ranges are very loud, while the oceans are silent having no data to produce. In the event space, a map was also hung so that you can have fun locating the satellites you listen to.

The artist, Jens Bland, is active in Cologne, Germany. In his white shirt, slacks and glasses, he looks like your stereotypical salesman. The exhibit space also looks like a showroom with flyers and a flat-panel monitor, even a decorative plant! One reason for the setup is that his own name is Bland, but in all seriousness, the G-Player allows you to hear a sound that can't be heard, the sound of the Earth as if it were an ordinary thing, and the room reflects this making it sound even more like the real thing. I love geography, so this sound is just absolutely amazing.

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Four bird cages were placed in the stairwell on the 2nd floor of the OK Center. Inside is a sparrow, but before long the sparrow is replaced by a flame, and if you listen carefully a voice emerges. As I wondered who was speaking, what I heard next from the flame was the excited voice of Hitler. Finally I understood, the owners of these voices were Franklin D. Roosevelt, Mussolini, Stalin... Their radio speeches from World War II were emerging from the flame.

What Paul Demarinis, the artist, was interested in was the history of radio. Although it became the first form of broadcast media, it seems the radio was first developed as a scientific way of communicating with the spirits of the dead, and later became a way for people to communicate over distances.

In the 1920s, the radio as transmitted media became a powerful tool for politics. Political voices were heard in homes for the first time and people accepted the ideas and criticism presented to them. In 1935, the public gathered in front of the radio instead of the fireplace and Roosevelt called his radio broadcasts "Fireside Chats".

A Fireside Chat transmitted in 1935 about reconsidering the savings system was the speech featured in this installation. Roosevelt, Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini all used the radio effectively.

Okay, what about the flame? According to Demarinis, the fire is a metaphor for the political speeches, what lit the world on fire. The other mystery of this installation is that the fire becomes the speaker. It is not well known, but when you apply voltage to fire, it is sucked inward acquiring the property of electrical conductivity. Sound is transmitted by vibrations in the air, and since the air vibrates due to the heat of the flame, it becomes a producer of sound.

Graham Bell's little brother Mervil was the first to discover that fire conducts electricity. It seems that the audio device he created consisted of two wires and fire according to the patent.

There's a lot of history packed into this small installation. Demarinis spend a long time researching radios and fire, and that time spent on this subject is trapped in the bird cage. Light bulbs and the sound of the Earth were definitely interesting, but this exhibit certainly surpasses all in its experimentation and new expressiveness.

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An Indian Music Festival was held in Hauptpatz. Nothing much was happening at first and I was beginning to wondering what exactly was going on, when a couple of Indian youth holding black radio-cassette players appeared. Some stood still, while others walked around. After a while, I heard someone singing. Following the voice, I saw a woman singing from the window of the University of Arts building. You could also hear her voice through the radio-cassette players, which resonated throughout the plaza.

Although I was skeptical about the cheap-looking gadgets at first, I was pleasantly surprised by the rich sound that they were emanating. To think that this performance may be an homage to the first ever Klangwolke (when the citizens of Linz placed radios and stereos on their windowsills and played electronic music throughout the city) made it all the more poignant.

After marching around the plaza, the band of Indians moved to a carpet and played 6 songs using traditional instruments. There were some television sets showing another Indian band playing music, and the band in front of us played along with the band on screen. Of course, the band on screen weren't playing live. The performance was steeped in nostalgia, what with the radio-cassette players and old TV sets.

Anyway, there was something special about listening to Indian music in a European town. A man and a woman sang songs infused with Kabirian philosophy as if it were an anthem of this town. I especially remember how the plaza gradually filled up with people being drawn to the sounds of the tablas and sitars, and everybody sitting around and cooling off, savoring the summer's end.
Come to think of it, the ARS festival is always held during the perfect season...

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An assortment of rubber sticks and wind-up toys are placed on a rectangular table, and a light beam runs along the surface of the objects. With the moving light comes sound... Basically, an infra-red camera reacts to objects placed on the table, and when the light beam comes in contact with an object, it makes a noise. Objects on the lower end of the table create low sounds, and vice versa.

The sound rings non-stop while the beam is in contact with an object, which means that you can compose your own "music" by rearranging the thick and thin objects on the table. This is an entertainment-oriented exhibit in line with the ARS Center's wide demographic. But maybe it's a tad too childish??

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Beginning in 2003, this event has gained popularity and is now held every year. During the event, a series of electronic music performances are held from early evening to late into the night, both in Bookner House, and the new Lentos Museum that opened in 2004. Rather than having all the performances run simultaneously like many music festivals, here the audience moves from one venue to the next, following the order of the performances.

The concept of the performances is to reflect on the history of electronic music. Starting with the modern music of John Cage and Philip Glass, the performances gradually move into noise and laptop music. The audience physically experience the evolution of electronic music as they stroll to the next venue, from past to future. The presentation is fantastic, and so very ARS.

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My final recommendation. The last work of ARS was Toshio Iwai's TENORI-ON performance. TENORI-ON is the next-generation instrument Iwai is collaborating with Yamaha to develop, and can be played by anyone, regardless of whether they're a novice or a pro.

The first thing to catch your eye is the 16x16 matrix of LED switches. If you push the switches or slide your finger over them, they emit these beautiful sounds and lights. And another Iwai-like feature is that there aren't only LEDs on the control pad, but on the back of the instrument, as well. The TENORI-ON isn't just enjoyed by the performer, but entertains the people watching it, too. And what's more, even if you don't have the techniques you'd need for other instruments, you can create the most unexpected LED miracles with it. I found it to be a truly happy musical interface.

It has a weight to it when you hold it, and feels well-made. When I held it in both hands, my spine naturally snapped into an upright posture, which made me imagine what I must look like holding it and think, "Hey, I might be looking pretty cool right now."

You can make music with it even if you don't know how to use it, but I think that you'd need more time with the TENORI-ON to make music the way you want it to sound.

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This isn't really my thing, and I don't even think it's very cool, but they're a local DJ unit from Barcelona. I was amused by the photograph of the three of them in their sunglasses and decided to go (much like buying an album just for its cover), but I was disappointed to find that they were mediocre, even from a DJ-ing perspective. Then again, I guess it was interesting to see such a large percentage of the audience wearing shades.

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The artists I unearthed at Sonar. Donning suits, they make music using toys. Very experimental. But the nostalgia of it all makes me feel an affinity towards the sounds and the artists themselves.

The real thrill of music festivals are those fateful encounters with artists that you don't know. Such moments are exhilarating.

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This will give you goose-bumps. This is rock, no doubt. As you can see from their name, Paul leads the band, which consists of calm drums and bass as hardcore as those Midwestern policemen. Although I didn't get to see Senor Coconut, I would say that this band got the audience hyped up the most. I'd love to see them again, or better yet, another two or three times, and immerse myself in their groove once more.

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Also from Germany - well, at least the mixing guy and the other one with the laptop are. Joining them is MC Scoom T from Scotland.

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A harsh, continuous shot. The MC furiously pumps up the audience, but they don't seem interested... I wonder why, they're not all that bad…

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For me, this performance by Mr. Sawai was the highlight of Sonar. It was so cool. I got goose-bumps, and was so caught up in his groove that I often forgot that I was filming. The sounds pierced through my flesh and set fire to my musical heart. So the camerawork might be a bit dodgy, but I guess that in itself gives the footage a certain flavor.

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Last year I introduced Toshio Iwai's TENORI-ON performance at part of last year's ARS Electronica 2005. Following on, Sonar sees Mr. Iwai creating sounds from 3 of his "instruments" - Sound Lens, TENORI-ON, and Electro Plankton.

Rootsy sounds of Sound Lens, TENORI-ON's short sound loops slowly overlapping to create music, and Electro Plankton's catchy, poppy sounds... Although very experimental, Mr. Iwai manages to present it as entertainment. Apparently this was the first live performance of this sort for him, and I feel immensely happy that I was able to see and record it.

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First up is Ms. Yanagisawa's performance. I actually shot this video at the very start of the first day of the festival. I went to the venue an hour before the performance to check the stage out, and confirm the positioning of the camera. However... once the performance began and I started rolling, I realized that her face and hands aren't in the picture. The stage is high up, and the instruments are larger than I thought. And Ms. Yanagisawa is petit. I should have known... I break out in a cold sweat! Oh no! I can't shoot anything. Time is ticking away. I desperately try to swing the camera to the sides and place the camera on stage, but the performance soon ends. The results were miserable. Mr. Maeda, coming from the back of the venue, asked me how it went. My reply: "I couldn't get a thing". Truly awful.

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The last band of Sonar 2006. They used small, strange instruments like maracas and harmonicas, and the crowed loved it. The rapper who came on stage as a guest also hyped up the audience. Once the festival drew to a close, a sense of sadness lingered in the venue... but there's always next year!

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