Air Salon

December 25 is a one-hour music piece that brings together a mixture of some of Maxine's favourite pieces of music, some of her own compositions, and a performance she presented as part of an exhibition by Katja Stoye-Cetin at uq-bar-a-ba.

The work explores ideas of place, time, physical presence, and mood—moving through happiness, joy, sadness, and despair within the space of an hour. It’s intended to feel like a mixtape listened to on a cold December day, where different emotional states and memories gently overlap and unfold.

This composition weaves audio recordings, texts and observations, mapping between two points and through actions, pauses, unfoldings. An ode to eavesdrops, to the sweetness of mindful floating through the light of day.

dot press is a collaborative practice run by Irene Mansoldo and Emily Johnston, based between Dublin and Berlin. Exploring publishing formats through the production of sound collage works, book objects, collaborative workshops – we generate cross-disciplinary outputs that best align with the nature of the material research we encounter. Stockists include: Hopscotch Reading Room, San Serriffe, TACO Gallery, Bureau for Listening Library. Broadcasts include: TACO Gallery, Refuge Worldwide, Dublin Digital Radio.

The Hakka (客家) people are a Chinese ethnic group originating from Northern China, but who migrated South to during the fall of the Song dynasty in the 1270s. "Hakka" literally means "Guest People", as to distinguish them from the natives (本地), and because the Hakka never fully assimilated into the native population. Later on, Hakka people migrated further to Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, India, and as far as Jamaica. They brought with them their own culture, food, language, and sense of nomadic openness. Over the past 7 months, I feel I have developed a much deeper relationship with my Hakka identity as I have been solo travelling across the globe. Everywhere I go, I am treated like a guest, and whenever people ask me where I'm from, it's hard to give one distinct answer. This mix explores migration as a continuous process of identity-building, specifically among the Hakka diaspora. By blending interviews that I conducted with the Hakka diasporic community, ambient nature sounds from regions where the Hakka people have lived, and some of my favourite tracks to listen to while travelling, this mix serves as a medium to highlight the interconnectedness of the Hakka people's shared experiences.

An hour-long program that attempts to sketch a glimmer of the spiritual and creative life I encountered when living in Lubumbashi, Congo last year. This is done trough fieldrecordings, music I discovered and listened to, some writing, and interviews with some of the people from my enviroment. The central question in these interviews “Comment tu prie?” arose from my own realisation that I did not know how to pray, a fundamental activity in Congolese life. The richness of the answers I got is incredible. The second half of the program is without talking and consists solely of music, slam poetry and performance by artists I enountered in Lubumbashi.

-People who make lists are organized.
-People who make lists think about all the features of an event or a situation in detail.
-Lists give people strength.
-People with a list do their work quickly.
-Lists facilitate communication with others.
-Lists lead people to an easy conclusion.
-Lists are actually a bit reductionist.

Central to the piece are the declassified secret service files compiled after the surveillance of Benyó's grandfather, a research engineer and political activist during Hungary's communist era. Our collaboration reimagines the architecture of the state archive, transforming it into a conceptual space representing totalitarian overreach through the excessive production of knowledge. O.J.A.I. contributes to this transformation by creating paranoid organizational atmospheres, conveyed through a series of fictional texts and modular sound compositions.

With:

O.J.A.I.

However Uncertainly, Across Space features audio from artist Damon Zucconi’s work Jailbreak alongside Eloise’s text Not Knowing. Intimacy. A Door Ajar.

Throughout the radio show, listeners will experience the audio from Jailbreak, a video piece that presents a trembling portrayal of a chandelier. Its lights flicker—on, off, and on again—conveying a sense of instability and incompletion. The piece feels only partially present, existing both here and elsewhere. Overlaying the visuals are voices reading fragments of a text, their sources unseen—disembodied figures reaching toward something or someone distant and intangible.

With:

Damon Zucconi

The title of the play Nos plats aigres irritent vos palais (our sour dishes irritate your palates) is a phrase taken from the French version of Bertolt Brecht's play "Antigone". This line, in its french translation, has a double meaning of the word « palais » which means both "der Gaumen, the palate" and "der Palast, the palace". This double layer embodies the will of this piece to create stories that can both irritate the palate and the palace of the privileged ones.The voices of the radio play have that in common that they challenge the system/cis-tem with words. Each of the voices tells stories that reclaim subjectivities different from the one inseminated by patriarchist and colonialist conceptions and other oppressive capitalist rules. Subjectivities who try to not rise above one and others, but connect and join to change the hegemonic euro-centric History into narratives that help us to build another meaning of being together on this planet.

This is a compilation of audible memories recorded over the past 8 years, which began with my first iphone, until then I must have had a nokia. there should be some recordings on there from longer ago, but I hold no hopes for being able to reach that far down. the oldest memo here was recorded in winter, the afternoon of the 7th of January, 2016. it plays the sound of having just stopped playing the piano at my dad's house in Jelgava, Latvia. I recorded these for no particular reason other than to keep the encounters near and have the option to reanimate them.

Otherwise available at paulabuskevica.com/voicememos – the web space that was used as the instrument for making this broadcast.

For her project whilst at the residency, Dóra Benyó got in touch with the Stasi Archive to learn more about their policy. The interview is about access to the files and how the Stasi Archive handles a request. Besides that, they discuss the international network between the archives of the former Eastern Bloc countries. How does the accessibility of the archive, and thus the accessibility of history, affect society and individuals?

The interview was held on 11 March 2024 by Dóra Benyó with Dr. Karsten Jedlitschka, Head of Division at the Stasi Records Archive, and Dr. Stephanie Jost, responsible for the cooperation in the Secret Police Archives Network.

Songs:
Ági és a fiúk - Veszélyes vonzerő
Illés – Nehéz Várni
A.E. Bizottság – Baab Schandau
Trabant – Esti kép
Kampec Dolores – Dzsungel
Sziámi – Elmaradott ország

There were some voice notes, or it might as well have been some whispers in the dark. I sleep light, so I wake up again at 3:35, and this is what I see: the white sound machine is red, and my oil diffuser is violet. The LED strip combines magenta (magenta doesn’t exist) and orange—y—a high pitch of a broken-down fridge from upstairs. Only I can hear it. Flashback to: He laughs while blasting the radio - speakers wonky about to explode my eardrums. I can whisper you this, and only this.

Downpour Reverie is a musical hug for heavy rain, with 20 fervent tracks handpicked by the artist to plunge you into the emotional spirit when the sky pours its heart out.

Tune in to tune out with Daisy Ray’s sonic compositions.

Tracklist:
(intro)
Kathleen Collins - Losing Ground (sample)
Madlib - MHBs (instrumental)
Milton Nascimento & Lô Borges - Um Girassol da Cor de Seu Cabelo
S*an D. Henry-Smith - all this shock & laughter / all this talk of apocalypse
7038634357 - Rose
MF DOOM - red & gold (instrumental)
RR - Near (text)
rafi - donde esta durruti
David Bowie - Right
Val Clipp - Hold me close
RR - I go back (text)
unknown - building, part III
Eddie Okwedy - Happy Survival
The Raincoats - Ooh Ooh La La La
The Slits - Man next door (version)
Anne Carson - Eros the Bittersweet, fragments read by Alina Lupu & Angeliki Tzortzakaki
Bloodstone - Natural High
Orkiestra Ósmego Dnia - Stream
RR - Dreieck (text)
The Lounge Lizards - Bob the Bob (live)
untitled - nieuwe opname 13 (edit) w/ r
Aretha Franklin ft. Smoky Robinson - Ooh Baby Baby (live)
Herbie Hancock - Gentle Thoughts (outro)

Current ABA resident Nelson Beer has teamed up with Aram Abbas, Lore DeSelys and Varoujan Chetirian to reimagine the surrealist tradition of the Cadavre Exquis through a one hour radio-format "découpé" of auditory compositions. After giving themselves the task of producing fifteen one-minute audio files, each of the four players worked around sounds evoking “the habitat.” These sixty one-minute audio files were then assembled using a cut-up technique which consists of scrambling each file into a randomised order.

An evocation of "otherness," the Cadavre Exquis emphasises variations in the style, experience, and sensibility of its participants. Chaperoned by reviews such as "playful," "fun," and "enriching," the game encourages players to recognise themselves upon discovery of the finished product. While simultaneously witnessing the collaborative birthing of a monster, players’ contrasting experiences, sensibilities and styles, if accepted, transform that monster into an expression of endeared alterity.

Furthermore, in the radio format which you are listening to, this cut-up technique occurs as a massive concentration of energy (MasCon), scrambling theme, structure and saturation, to the point where our temporal relationship to space transforms. Chronicles of the everyday are elucidated through the poetic rearrangement of sound, foregrounding the necessity of moving towards an approval of "difference" within the collective body (no vin nouveau).

With:

On Land Collective

This is a radio show about the writer Duncan Smith, the introduction is an abridged version of ‘Impressed’, a text I wrote in 2021 and originally published in Catalog issue 17.
Writer Duncan Smith (1954-1991) excels at making wild connections.
His essay, ‘Everybody wants exposure’ builds on the speculative relationship between the process of developing photographs and fading denim jeans.
‘An interpretation of Elvis’ car-giving’ talks about exactly that: Elvis’ habit to give out Cadillacs and the interpretation of the name ‘Cadillac’ as a virtual rebus of events in Elvis’s life: ‘cad’: 50s slang for a bad boy, ‘ill’: ill and ‘lac’: lack.

Iggy and The Stooges - Gimme Danger
Gregg Bordowitz - Gimme Danger (lecture) [excerpt]
Devo - (I can’t get no) satisfaction (from ‘Kidnapped’, dir. Eric Mitchell, 1978)
DNA - Blonde Red Head (from ‘Downtown 81’, dir. Edo Bertoglio, 1980/2000)
‘Elvis Presley's Pink Cadillac’ (GWAT TV YouTube channel)
James Chance and ...more

In this show we will be travelling from the grey concrete wetlands of Marzahn, to the arid deserts of Merzouga. We might end up taking a few detours, smoke some cigarettes, do some groceries and find out that true beauty always lies one, or several, tedious bus rides away. So sit back, relax, and we'll make sure you’ll be brought back home safely.

Estelle Hoy reads from her latest book, Pisti, 80 Rue de Belleville (After 8 Books, Paris), and from a series of text-based artworks. Mauro Hertig contributes a new vocal piece, alongside two existing pieces: the string quartet Silly Empath, and a multichannel tape piece, Liquid Contra.

About Pisti, 80 Rue de Belleville:
A wild nocturnal frolic among the anarchists and hipsters of Paris: Elke is a young academic with a troubled past that keeps spilling onto her present. Just as she is about to leave town for a writing retreat, she meets Pisti, a charismatic, hard-boiled, but luscious Hungarian left activist who runs an anarchist collective in Paris. Over one night in a Belleville apartment, old friends and new lovers discuss–and act–polyamory, politics, and the art of conversation.

Mauro Hertig is a Swiss composer with an output of ensemble, chamber and site-specific works. He creates stage environments as game-like settings, using sounds of intimate speech, touch and instructions.

Estelle Hoy is a writer and academic based in Berlin. She completed her PhD in Contemporary Feminist Experimental Literature. “Pisti, 80 Rue de Belleville,” released in 2020, was her second novel.

A joint listening session: collide with others, bring your leftover vegetables and create some soup while listening to this ABA Air SALON.

For this radio show, Stefanie De Bakker invites Elke Cuppens and Stef Lemmens to talk about food, collectivity, community, and living. These 60 minutes were created to gather, connect, inspire and relax.

With:

Elke Cuppens & Stef Lemmens

You are listening to a multilogue of recorded messages, a conversation that is many-to-many, yet one-way. By artificially (re)constructing a conversation that never really took place, this edition of ABA’s Air Salon is referring to a contemporary phenomenon you might recognize: sending voice messages back and forth instead of having a conversation – sometimes long monologues that don’t expect an answer, sometimes exchanging multiple 3 second snippets instead of just giving the other a call. As a contemporary form, the voice message and its ever-growing popularity might hold some relevance for collective practices and how they often (dis)function: a lot of sending and receiving, conflating multiple channels, to eventually (and hopefully) end up having a conversation that matters, but never speaking with one voice.

soft power is a collectively run non-profit art association and venue for artistic projects that combines curatorial, artistic, sociological and design approaches in an ongoing engagement with the structural realities and political conditions of (collective) practices. In our voice messages, we are asking questions about collective work, its ups and downs, its potential for dividing efforts and multiplying outcomes (sometimes the other way around), and the alternatives it may pose to the way that art is produced and consumed. We sent our questions to other Berlin-based collectives or collectively organised projects, and received some voice messages in return – joining us with their Voice messages for the collective ear are:

Alicia Reuter, co-founder and co-director of the Berlin Art Prize
Anissa Carrington, co-founder and member of the DJ network SLIC Unit
Viviane Tabach & Theseas Efstathopoulos, two sobat-sobat (documenta fifteen’s group of art mediators) and editors of the publication Ever Been Friendzoned by an Institution?.
Tra My Nguyen, co-founder and member of the design collective Studio ABO

With:

Alicia Reuter, Anissa Carrington, Tra My Nguyen, Viviane Tabach & Theseas Efstathopoulos

Dorothy Wong Ka Chung and Benjamin Ryser (o!sland) are an artist duo currently at the residency of ABA. After Hong Kong’s 2019 democracy movement, they started an ongoing project about the imaginations of home of Hongkongers who left their city during the different migration waves of the past decades.

This radio show features stories from the way home in Berlin and Hong Kong. It’s a part of an ongoing search for street corners, moments in time and personal memories where these two cities touch and their histories speak to each other. What is belonging when we lose the sense of home? These stories are not only crossing geographically, but also travel between times and generations. How do the experiences of the German separation resonate with Hong Kong’s future?

Underground stations and a minibus, world clock, a blue school uniform, singing a song in the night, arriving at Brandenburger Tor, Victoria/Viktoria/維多利亞 statues, standing under the rain, what time is it over there?

In the end, you are invited to join an audio walk through a supermarket, walking in Berlin and walking in Hong Kong. You can take the walk in any supermarket near you. Just bring your headphones and we will meet at the entrance of the supermarket at 16:40.

Voice actors & actresses: Maria Sautter, Meret Roth, Santayana Li, Sebastian Ryser, Tsoi Wan Wa Shirley
Participants Charlotte Lee, Ho Hin Chan, Mary Lee, Sai Wing Lau, Tsoi Wan Wa Shirley, Wing Yin Tang
Translator: Charlotte Lee

Edo Bouman is a tropical vinyl specialist from Amsterdam, the Netherlands. He is the co-founder of the Vintage Voudou record shop, and Bombay Connection Records. He specializes in sourcing the most incredible music from all around the world, recorded in countries ranging from Trinidad to Kenya, Greece, Gabon, Guadeloupe, Ethiopia, Egypt, India, Turkey, Thailand and beyond. The emphasis is on music with traditional, rootsy elements from the 50s, 60s and 70s, resulting in an contrasting, vibrant mix of genres as diverse as tsifteteli, forro, taarab biguine, calypso, jive, high life, shangaan, luk thung and mambo. With the Vintage Voudou crew, he regularly organizes music events and performs as DJ.

Behind the Mountains is a show on Echo Box Radio hosted by Rozaly "shedding light on what lies behind the mountains: the music and culture you never expected to be there." The focus is usually on electronic music. Edo Bouman focusses in this edition on world wide analog sounds.

Edo Bouman is a tropical vinyl specialist from Amsterdam, the Netherlands. He is the co-founder of the Vintage Voudou record shop, and Bombay Connection Records. He specializes in sourcing the most incredible music from all around the world, recorded in countries ranging from Trinidad to Kenya, Greece, Gabon, Guadeloupe, Ethiopia, Egypt, India, Turkey, Thailand and beyond. The emphasis is on music with traditional, rootsy elements from the 50s, 60s and 70s, resulting in an contrasting, vibrant mix of genres as diverse as tsifteteli, forro, taarab biguine, calypso, jive, high life, shangaan, luk thung and mambo. With the Vintage Voudou crew, he regularly organizes music events and performs as DJ.

Behind the Mountains is a show on Echo Box Radio hosted by Rozaly "shedding light on what lies behind the mountains: the music and culture you never expected to be there." The focus is usually on electronic music. Edo Bouman focusses in this edition on world wide analog sounds.

Echo Box Radio is an independent internet radio station based in Amsterdam.

In one hour radio piece, Marjolein van der Meer takes you on a journey through inspirations and explorations around her latest project I AM SEVERAL. This hour includes choir pieces, hip hop and some of her own musical and textual experiments.

I AM SEVERAL is an electronic music piece leading up to a performance, using a polyphony of voices, from the inside and out, to address diversity. It is about the different people we can be, pluriformity versus surrender, the individual versus the group. The piece uses everyday situations, sounds and movement to create a certain unity, a choir of people in which each individual's autonomy can be reflected. This project is about finding ones voice, about being autonomous and the loneliness this can bring forth, but also about ways in which we are so elementary alike. Made in collaboration with choreographer Merel Franx.

A conversation with Lisette Smits (Curator, Researcher, Educator), Rosanna Lovell (Musician, Educator) and Jürg Andreas Meister (radio host, media composer)

During the two hour radio salon we will go into the practices of our guests, each working in their own way as programmer/curator/artist/collaborator/educator. We hope to connect different positions, find similarities and differences and learn from each others experience. We will talk about voice as an artistic medium, the practice of creating and giving a platform or space for particular voices as well as speaking vs listening. Alternately we will listen to short audio-fragments connected to the practices of our guests. We will listen and review them together during this two hour radio show.

For this broadcast on Colaboradio, Magali Dougoud proposes a program called Women Waves, connecting Womxn, Water and Voices in a poetic and ethic approach. Through texts, voice-overs from her previous videos, sound pieces and music, she constructs a collage of reflections using the same process of montage as in her visual work.