As part of the opening ceremony in Horní Dvořiště, students from the master’s program Postdigital Lutherie developed two instruments especially for this year’s festival theme.
Inspired by a stretch of decommissioned railway track, the site-specific sculptural instrument SLEEPERS was developed. Several players collaboratively interacted with the rail sleepers, ranging from subtle caressing, heavy body motions to percussive gestures in the style of a large-scale marimba.
The PNEUMONIUM – an experimental pneumatic musical instrument – uses air pressure to acoustically synthesize a percussive sound experience. An array of digitally controlled valves feeds into several high-pressure sound generators, enabling the creation of a pneumatic techno performance in Horní Dvořiště, the Czech border station of the Summerauer Railway.
Sound composition and live performance:
SLEEPERS: Fatima El-Kosht, Omid Zolfaghari, Aldin Dapo
PNEUMONIUM: Michael Kramer, Ozan Tezvaran, Thomas Geissl
Technical support: Festo, Kaeser
Thanks to Martin Kaltenbrunner I Tangible Music Lab (Kunstuniversity Linz)
Documentation