Unsound London Returns to the Barbican on 6th May. Also: Unsound Streaming 2022 Discourse Program

Unsound returns to London – and the Barbican – on the 6th May, with a showcase of three works that premiered at Unsound Kraków 2022, featuring established and rising names in experimental and electronic music. Tickets and are available via the Barbican website.

Supergroup Osmium features Academy Award winning composer Hildur Guðnadóttir, Grammy-winning British sound designer and producer Sam Slater, genre-hopping scene veteran James Ginzburg (emptyset) and idiosyncratic Indonesian vocalist Rully Shabara (Senyawa). Together they create surprising and hypnotic music using custom-built instruments, finding a balance between the mechanical and the organic.

Inspired by Polish A/V innovator Stanisław Ostoja-Kotkowski, Australia Robin Fox's new work is described as an "audio visual space-time carving" that will use laser projectors to transform the Barbican’s unique architecture into a completely new environment. 

Copenhagen-based sound artist Sofie Birch and Polish vocalist Antonina Nowacka recently released their acclaimed collaborative album Languoria, seamlessly blending Birch’s dreamlike ambient forms with Nowacka’s thrillingly unique vocals. The live show revisits the album, yet is full of improvisation, and also features set design by Ukrainian artist Planeta and lighting by Jacqueline Sobiszewski.

As for online activities, over the next several weeks we’re streaming highlights from the Unsound Kraków 2022 discourse program. The series has already kicked off with Kate Molleson, in conversation with Jennifer Lucy Allan, talking about her new book Sound Within Sound, a reappraisal of twentieth-century classical music, shattering its traditional canon. Tune in every Tuesday at 7pm CET on our Facebook and Youtube channels, to catch the following shows:

31/01 – Westplaining (Yulia Krivich, Jan Smoleński, Tatiana Kozak i Kaja Puto)

7/02 – Building Bridges Between Bubbles Conversation (Wassim Z. Alsindi, Laura Lotti, Paul Seidler) 

14/02 – Artist talk: Speculative Music (Wojciech Rusin i Jennifer Lucy Allan)

21/02 – Geography, Magic and Decolonised Sounds (Yennu Ariendra, Debit, DeForrest Brown Jr.)

28/02 – The Evolution of Music (Michael Spitzer)

07/03 – Cyberfeminism and Neopatriarchy (Joanna Walsh, Karolina Sulej)