for Mechanical Brass & Magnetic Strings (2025)

How can a piano sing without anyone touching the keys? How can instruments be built to play themselves — while opening new spaces for listening? For Jo David Meyer Lysne and Peder Simonsen, such questions are less about answers than about exploring new sonic possibilities.

For this year’s Ekkofestival, the two artists present a site-specific sound installation that invites audiences to experience space through resonance, movement, and sound.

Composer and instrument builder Jo David Meyer Lysne, based in Gvarv, has developed a series of self-playing acoustic instruments in which electromagnets and robotic mechanisms activate strings within carefully tuned resonant systems. His works for retuned piano and electromagnets have gained international attention, and he has collaborated with artists including Sanae Yoshida, Amalie Stalheim, Vilde&Inga, and Aksiom.

Composer, tubist, and electronics builder Peder Simonsen works across experimental music and sound art. Together, Lysne and Simonsen have developed a shared practice in which materiality, acoustics, and precise control of intonation and timbre form the basis for immersive sonic environments. Their projects explore how sound can shape situations that sharpen and expand the listener’s attention.

At Ekkofestivalen they invite audiences into such situations: rooms that play, tones that slowly unfold, machines that sing — and a mode of listening that might make you hear your surroundings with new ears.

During the installation, two concerts will also take place featuring guest artists Oren Ambarchi and Martin Taxt.