in brief
15.10.2022

Lunken tur i tårnet

Brønshøj Vandtårn: »Upserving 22 – Celebrating Water«
© Pernille Kieulff
© Pernille Kieulff

På vej ind i Brønshøj Vandtårns brutalistiske rum af cementsokler og bjælker blev jeg indhyllet af et vedkommende og levende udtryk. Projektorer kastede farvet lys og vandteksturer ud på loftshængte skulpturer, der skabte animerede skygger rundt i vandtårnets cylinderform. Sådan er rammerne for Upserving 22 – Celebrating Water, en udstilling med en række workshops, koncerter – og så denne koncert med inoxfon, ensemble og digteren Liv Ea.

Inoxfonen er et instrument, der med sine 400 upcyclede fade og skåle i rustfrit stål tænder en lysende interesse i en. Den er bygget af Ian Brodersen, der også spillede på inoxfonen, som løftede sig til at være mere end et instrument; snarere en skulptur, legetøj eller anti-affald.

Der var en synergi mellem rummet, lyset og instrumentet, og jeg slap hverdagens banale forståelse af det rindende vand i min lejlighed og var klar til at hylde vandet som magisk, uundværligt og livgivende. Men min begejstring ville desværre en ende tage, for da Liv Ea tog mikrofonen og musikerne slog an, blev dette ellers skarpe udtryk sløret. Musikerne kunne ikke etablere en medrivende kontakt med hverken hinanden, musikken eller publikummet og var af nød afhængige af cues og improvisation.

Det ellers stærkt etablerede tema om vand slap op. Koncerten var en time uden særlige overraskelser, hvor man som publikum famlede efter en forståelse af, hvorfor man var der. Til sidst sad jeg bare og frøs.

© Simon Weyhe

»Music for me is my hobby, my job, my outlet, my mood, an endless source of discovering new music and new, old music, some of the best and can be some of the worst. And I love it!« 

Track72 aka Tue Track aka Anders Lundby Brixen. Producer, DJ, rapper and more. Known for his role in the trio Malk De Koijn, which since the mid-1990s has created a personal universe in Danish hip-hop. Has performed in Ponyblod, Xtra Naan, Track Abdullah Rock, Booty Cologne and others.

© PR
© PR

On Wednesday, 5 August 2026, it happened again: a chord in John Cage’s Organ2/ASLSP (As Slow as Possible) changed after two and a half years. Classic FM reports.

The work was written by the American avant-garde composer John Cage in the mid-1980s. The score consists of eight pages of music, and, as the title suggests, the instruction is to play it »as slow as possible.«

»What music is to me? Where have the great feelings gone?«.

Gellért Szabó is a composer, conductor and performer based in Leipzig, Germany. His work combines contemporary composition with influences from free improvisation, noise and the expressive richness of the late nineteenth century. He is the founder and artistic director of the 23-piece Ideal Orchestra, an ensemble dedicated to large-scale experimental music of sweeping emotional intensity. Alongside this work, Szabó performs internationally with his solo project Radical Radio Show, exploring symphonic textures and immersive sound worlds through a single electric guitar and live electronics. His music is driven by a search for intensity, vulnerability and uncompromising emotional expression.

© Christoffer Askman
© Christoffer Askman

From the Culture Yard in Helsingør, ships glide past Kronborg Castle through the narrow waters of the Øresund – a reminder of the trade routes that, for centuries, have carried goods, people and power between the Nordic region and the wider world. It is an apt point of departure for the Passage Festival, and for Marie Dahl's vocal work Silk. Sugar. Sand, which explores the intertwined histories of three materials.

Silk. Sugar. Sand is a vocal performance in three acts tracing the historical journeys of these materials through colonialism, the global economy and geopolitics. Five singers from Ars Nova Copenhagen perform within a minimalist scenography consisting almost entirely of coloured light and three sets of costumes that transform throughout the performance: first silk dresses, then crinoline-like structures evoking sugar loaves, and finally grey stone-like forms suggesting accumulations of sand.

The work's central device is to translate the physical properties of these materials into vocal expression. At one moment, the elasticity of silk becomes soft, flowing polyphony; at the next, a cocoon-like electronic crackle. Sugar's crystalline structure is rendered as sharp vocal attacks – brief, whip-like cracks – as well as sweet, intimate whispers, while sand creaks and rustles, resonating with a libretto about economy and domination, violence and desire.

The performance has no conventional narrative, and the five singers portray no distinct characters, moving somewhat stiffly across the stage, as performers often do when their primary focus is on the voice. Comparisons with Hotel Pro Forma's Flammenwerfer are difficult to avoid. There, the production's rigorous aesthetic was counterbalanced by C.F. Hill's wildly expressive visual universe and Blixa Bargeld's deeply vulnerable stage presence. Those qualities are missing from Marie Dahl's carefully controlled staging, which could have benefited from more of the sensitivity and chaos that also form part of Kirsten Dehlholm's artistic legacy.

© PR

»To us, music is a primal, elemental force that allows us to shed our inhibitions.«

Leizure is a Copenhagen-based quintet operating at the intersection of post-punk, no wave, and experimental rock. The band’s sound is characterized by atonal vocals, piercing saxophone, hypnotic guitar riffs, and a rhythmic foundation that oscillates between tight precision and raw intensity. 

The band’s upcoming album, The Guillotine, explores themes such as societal decay, upheaval, and the challenging of established structures – all conveyed through a direct and high-energy musical style.