Sonic Sphere Lab Sessions

JUL 11 – 13, 18 – 20, & 25 – 27, 2023
Experimental pop-up sessions inside Sonic Sphere

About this program

Join members of the Sonic Sphere collective and their collaborators for a pop-up laboratory session inside the sphere. Each session’s surprise program will vary. You may experience anything from dance and intellectual debate to experimental music, soundscapes, and more.

The Sonic Sphere collective’s process of innovation and iteration is driven by this experimental methodology. In these spontaneous sessions, the seeds of tomorrow’s great art are born. Expect community, mischief, and brilliance.

Lab Sessions Schedule

July 11: Introduction to the Labs

Sonic Sphere is a collective above all, a laboratory of the senses. To give shape to their experiments they collaborate with artists on how to write original work for Sonic Sphere. They remix, deconstruct, and render existing works from the widest spectrum of genres into the spatial forma while trying to invent ever-developing tools to interact with, create for, and experience the sphere.

In this session, the Sonic Sphere team will showcase some of their classic experiments and spatializations and engage participants in an interactive dialogue on the challenges and opportunities posed by working in a spherical format.

With Merijn Royaards, Sonic Sphere Co-Founder and Creative Director

July 12: Enveloped in Verse: Live Storytelling in Sonic Sphere

This session reimagines the age-old tradition of sharing stories in a circle by taking the audience through a live, three-dimensional journey of words. As original pieces by four poets weave their tapestry of sound and metaphor, the audience will be enveloped in a shared moment of narrative immersion and connection.

Poets Danielle Bero, Lauren Ducrey, Kyle Studstill, and Cea (Constantine Jones) invite you into the heartbreaking idiosyncrasies of personal experience that lead straight to the universal heartbeat that sits at the center of every story. Where poems say out loud what we all feel down low.

With music by Spencer Handley

July 13: Soundscapes with Madame Gandhi and Atropolis
Madame Gandhi, along with her long-term collaborator, the producer and educator Atropolis, will present experimental live soundscapes from Antarctica and the forest. After presenting their work, they’ll engage in a discussion on the use of music and sound to create empathy.
July 18, 9 pm: Voices of the World with Spencer Handley
Take a tour through the voice traditions of the world with ethnomusicologist, musician, and technologist Spencer Handley.
July 19, 9 pm: Original Compositions from Raquel Acevedo Klein and Joe Mardin

Composer Raquel Acevedo Klein and sound artist Joe Mardin will present original works.

Polyphonic Interlace by Raquel Acevedo Klein

Polyphonic Interlace is a multilayered, surround-sound music experience made entirely of the composer’s voice. Inspired by the Renaissance motet Spem In Alium by Thomas Tallis, Acevedo Klein composed and recorded each layer of the piece in order to emulate the sound of a large chorus and symphony using her solo voice, during the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown. The music that emanates from the house and ancillary speakers transforms into a sonic tapestry, aiming to unite people through music.

Noises In My Head by Joe Mardin

The excerpted scenes featured in this presentation for Sonic Sphere are from the play, Noises In My Head, with sound design and music by Joe Mardin. Written by Turkish playwright Beliz Güçbilmez, the English-language version of Noises In My Head was originally produced at the Theater for the New City in the fall of 2022 and was directed by Manfred Bormann. The production featured actress Defne Halman, who voices the pieces in this presentation.

July 20, 9 pm: Party on the Moon with the Sonic Sphere Team
On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first humans to land on the moon. Join the Sonic Sphere team this July 20 for a preview of the first party on the moon, due to take place around 2031. The experiential journey begins with immersive audio of the Apollo 11 launch by Merijn Royaards and then incorporates an imagined dinner, fireworks, and dance (in specially adapted low-gravity dance music from beatboxer and percussionist J. Stone alongside singer Serena Grace). Over the course of this immersive preview of the actual first party on the moon, after which you will subsequently feel as if you have in fact partied on the moon, you’ll also hear original 3-D music from Ivy Fu and Tony Grund, topped off with spoken word poetry from 15th-century poet John Milton.
July 25, 9 pm: Diminished Doorways with Amanda Lind and Stephon Alexander
The sound design for Diminished Doorways follows a melodic thread including field recordings taken in doorways, over thresholds, and in various environments, inviting the listener to follow along and render the details of air quality, temperature, and scale in the mind’s eye. The sound design punctuates and supports an inquisitive melody, which is sometimes fragile and demure and at other times imposing. With a melodic theme initially conceived by Stephon Alexander and Donald Harrison.
July 26, 9 pm: Rolfe Kent Conducts

Enter the music, join the composition, and throw your own ecstatic howl into the massed chorus of voices as the air trembles in song.

Composer Rolfe Kent conducts an experience combining specially composed 360-degree music within Sonic Sphere with choral audience participation to create a sonic medley that resonates through your mind and body. Each session is designed for your input and uses detailed mixes layered with deep dimensional backbeats that rock the dome as you are guided into stunning harmony by Kent. Enchanting, captivating, and wholly unique, this participatory experience is not to be missed.

July 27, 1:30 pm: Live Electronica with FOSS (Romain Collin and Jeremy Loucas)
Electronic music duo FOSS (Romain Collin and Jeremy Loucas) has created a bespoke show for Sonic Sphere’s lights and surround-sound system. With tape machines and tape loops, live sampling, modular synthesizers, and vocals, their music blends songwriting with ambient experimental soundscapes.

Participants

A white man in a black tshirt with a graphic depicting three people dressed all in white looks to his left while working a DJ booth. He wears headphones over his ears.
Courtesy Merijn Royaards.
Merijn Royaards
Merijn Royaards
JUL 11
Merijn Royaards is a sound architect, researcher, and performer guided by convoluted movements through music, art, and spatial studies. The interaction between space and sound in cities with a history/present of conflict has been a recurring theme in his multimedia works to date. His 2020 awarded doctoral thesis explores the state-altering effects of sound, space, and movement from the Russian avant-garde to today’s clubs and raves. He is one part of a critical-essay film practice with artist-researcher Henrietta Williams and teaches sound design for film and installation art at the Bartlett School of Architecture.
Danielle Bero
JUL 12
Danielle Bero was born in Queens to hippie parents, and given a dose of Shel Silverstein, Tupac, jazz, and classic rock. Bero is a Posse scholar, taught in Indonesia on a Fulbright scholarship, and co-founded a school for students in foster care. She holds a master’s in English education, educational leadership and completed her MFA at the University of San Francisco. She’s won slam competitions including Nuyorican Poets Café, Bowery Poetry Club, Ubud Writers festival. Bero is a Jack Straw Fellow, SAS festival poetry winner, and is published in the Divine Feminist anthology as well as lit mags. She recently began working on films and wrote and directed a short film Fruit Loops.
Lauren Ducrey
JUL 12
Lauren Ducrey is a poet, student of mindfulness, and senior UX content strategist at Google. When she’s not designing more emotionally supportive chatbots, she’s on a mission to break poetry out of its ivory tower as an accessible means to support everyone’s wellbeing. She published her first book of poetry Tongues Tied in November 2021 and released Cordes sensibles, an EP of poetry and music, in May 2022. Her words are also featured in mindfulness apps Minderful and Rogalife to massage your brain into heightened states of aliveness.
Dr. Adam Falkner
JUL 12
Dr. Adam Falkner (he/him) is a poet and musician, educator, and race and equity strategist. His work focuses on intersectional themes of race, gender, queer life, and social justice education. He is the author of The Willies (winner of the 2021 Midwestern Independent Book Award and a 2021 Foreword Reviews Gold Medal) and Adoption (winner of the Diode Editions Chapbook Award), and his writing has been featured on programming for HBO, in the Guardian, the New York Times, and elsewhere. He has toured the United States as a guest artist, lecturer, and trainer, and was the featured performer at President Obama’s Grassroots Ball at the 2009 Presidential Inauguration.
Spencer Handley
JUL 12
Spencer Handley is a musician, ethnomusicologist, educator, and technologist. As a fully nomadic ethnomusicologist, his studies have brought him all over the world and steeped him in the folk music traditions of Brazil, Argentina, Ireland, Spain, Nepal, Appalachia, and the Indigenous music of the Northern Amazon. With a background as an engineer and product leader, he helped build the artist funding platform Patreon.com and currently runs a music education company called Sonora, which builds mastery paths for musicians.
Constantine Jones
JUL 12
Constantine Jones is a Greek American thingmaker raised in Tennessee and housed in Brooklyn. They are the coordinator of the Visual AIDS Oral History Project, THE BODY AS AN ARCHIVE, as well as a member of the collective, What Would An HIV Doula Do?. They are the author of the novella IN STILL ROOMS (The Operating System, 2020) and a collaborative chapbook with Portuguese visual artist Vicente Sampaio, BALEEN: A POEM IN TWELVE DAYS (Ursus Americanus, 2022). Their work has been performed or exhibited across NYC and Tennessee. You can find them at StoriesAndNoise.com.
Kyle Studstill
JUL 12
Kyle Studstill is a Brooklyn-based performance poet and word artist. His work is about finding deep humility, about reckoning with our own vivid and terrifying self-awareness, and about being better humans in a more-than-human world. His story-driven writing has been appeared in Monocle Magazine, CreativeMornings, and Fast Company. His word art has been featured by NYC street art pillars Up Magazine, Sour Mouse, and 188 Allen. His performance poetry has been featured by the Poetry Brothel, Inspired Word NYC, and the New York City Poetry Festival.
Madame Gandhi
JUL 13
Madame Gandhi is an award-winning artist and activist known for her uplifting, percussive electronic music and positive message about gender liberation and personal power. She began producing music in 2015, after her story running the London Marathon free-bleeding to combat menstrual stigma went viral around the world. She has been listed as Forbes 30 Under 30 in Music, and her 2020 TED Talk about conscious music consumption has been viewed over a million times. “Waiting For Me,” shot in Mumbai, India, won the Music Video Jury Award at SXSW Film Festival in 2021 and her 100% Organically Sourced x Sound MANA nature sound pack won the New Wav award at the 2021 Splice Awards. Her third studio album, Vibrations, was released in 2022, following the release of her previous albums Voices (2016) and Visions (2019). In June of 2022, Gandhi completed a masters in music science and technology at Stanford University’s CCRMA where she spent time in Antarctica sampling the sounds of glaciers melting to create empathy and awareness around climate change.
Atropolis
JUL 13
Adam Partridge a.k.a. Atropolis from Sound MANA, has been producing, performing, and mixing with Ableton Live for over 15 years. With releases on various international labels, licensed commercials, and scored art installations featured in the Queens Museum and The Shed, Atropolis has also taught Ableton Live for 10 years, with extensive experience teaching novice to Grammy Award–winning artists.
Spencer Handley
JUL 18
Spencer Handley is a musician, ethnomusicologist, educator, and technologist. He runs a music education company called Sonora, which helps intermediate instrumentalists reach a high level of musical fluency using a hybrid of cutting-edge learning technology and world-class mentorship. As a fully nomadic ethnomusicologist, his studies have brought him all over the world and steeped him in the folk music traditions of Brazil, Argentina, Ireland, Spain, Nepal, Appalachia, and the Indigenous music of the Northern Amazon.

Important Details

  • Running time: 60 minutes
  • Doors open 30 minutes before the program begins; doors close promptly at the ticketed start time, and there is no late seating.
  • This program includes flashing lights and strobe effects.
  • This program includes haze effects.
  • Children under six are not permitted in the sphere; children six to 14 must be accompanied by an adult.
  • The sphere’s listening platform is 34 feet off the ground and is reached via three flights of stairs, approximately 50 steps. A lift is available for those with accessibility needs.
  • In-the-round seating includes netted lounges and a netted center.
  • Wear flat-soled shoes.
  • Large bags, backpacks, and tripods are not permitted in the sphere. There is a coat check for these items on the mezzanine level of The Shed.
  • Be mindful of small personal items that could become loose and fall from the sphere.

Learn more about Sonic Sphere.

Location and dates

This event takes place in The McCourt.

July 11 – 13, 18 – 20, 25 – 27

The Shed is located at 545 West 30th Street, between 10th and 11th Avenues. View The Shed on a map.

For information about accessibility and arriving at The Shed, visit our Accessibility page.

Accessibility

Entering Sonic Sphere

The listening platform is suspended 34 feet off the ground. It can be reached via three flights of stairs (approximately 50 steps) or an accessible lift.

Seating

Sonic Sphere features a listening platform with netted lounges and a netted center.

Purchasing Tickets

The Shed’s online ticketing system includes the option to submit accommodation requests beyond the access points detailed here.

Contact Us

For questions or other requests, visit the Accessibility page, email accessibility@theshed.org, or call (646) 455-3494.

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Thank you to our partners

The creation of new work at The Shed is generously supported by the Lizzie and Jonathan Tisch Commissioning Fund and the Shed Commissioners.

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