19:00
OPENING OF THE FESTIVAL. AQUASONIC: Music project under water between music (DK)
Artistic director, composer, vocals, hydraulophone: Laila Skovmand
Innovative director, violin, crystallophone: Robert Karlsson
Vocals, rotacorda: Nanna Bech
Percussion: Moran Le Bars
Drums: Morten Poulsen
Sound designer and engineer: Roman Komar
Light designer and engineer: Rune Halken Tønnes
Technical director and stage manager: Claus Madsen
First sound design: Anders Boll
First light design: Adalsteinn Stefansson
Co-produced by: Aarhus 2017 European Capital of Culture
AquaSonic was originally produced by: FuturePerfect Productions
Supported by: Danish Arts Foundation
Aarhus Municipality, DJBFA.W
Duration: 55 min.
Location: Arena „Švyturys“ (Dubysos str. 10)
* Corner of the critics:
“Spellbinding” / “Watching the presentation, it was hard to trust your own eyes.” – New York Times [US]
“AquaSonic is an amazing mix of fantasies and spectacles. It can justly be called a miracle.” – Edison, Hong Kong
“AquaSonic has a sound that is haunting in the most beautiful way.” – Huffington Post [UK]
Five performers submerge themselves in glass water tanks to play custom-made instruments and sing entirely underwater. Transformed inside these darkly glittering, aquatic chambers, they produce compositions that are both eerily melodic and powerfully resonant. AquaSonic is the culmination of years of research into the exciting possibilities of submerged musical performance, breaking barriers and challenging existing paradigms. The artists conducted countless experiments in collaboration with deep-sea divers, instrument makers and scientists to develop entirely new, highly specialized subaqueous instruments. These include an underwater organ or hydraulophone, crystallophone, rotacorda, percussion and violin. The team also perfected a distinctive vocal technique for underwater singing. The result is a concert experience completely out of the ordinary; a deep dive into a magical new universe of images and sounds. After 10 years of work, AquaSonic had it’s world premiere in the Netherlands in 2016. It is now a viral phenomenon and the concert is requested all over the world.
AWARDS & RECOGNITIONS
Music Theatre Now Winner (Between Music’s AquaSonic was selected as one of 10 winners out of 436 shows)
ADC Awards – Merit in category Innovation/Experimental design
Human Underwater Society – Public prize from the Tahiti based organization, that works to improve the connection between Humans and the underwater environment
Discovery channel – 1st prize in the program Outrages acts of science
Between Music create and produce innovative performance concerts in a hybrid of music, live performance, visual arts and new technology. The group masters a huge range of aesthetics, skills and genres, but finds the most potential in the fluctuating spaces between them. Between Music’s creative work involves a multidisciplinary network of musicians, physicist, engineers, instrument makers, neuroscientists etc. – all driven by the same passion for exploring, creating and pushing the boundaries of what we know. The international collaboration with experts within each their field inspires and ensures the high quality and integrity that characterizes Between Music’s artistic work.
Photo: Charlotta de Miranda
