Sonic Interventions Intervening Arts - Freie Universität Berlin

This conversation with Zara Julius concludes our third podcast season dedicated to South African sound art and cultures. The artist shares thoughts on and samples from her exhibition “Whatever You Throw At The Sea” (Weltmuseum Vienna, Austria), and critically reflects on (post)colonial structures in museums and archives in relation to her artistic research.

In this episode recorded at the University of Pretoria, Prof. Nompumelelo Zondi, gives insights into her book on women’s song in rural Zulu culture. She presents an understanding of song as a medium of resistance and resilience, and uses her own voice to share examples.

This episode features cellist, composer, and scholar Dr. Thokozani Mhlambi, who talks about the role of radio, music traditions as cultural archives, and baroque cello in the context of South Africa. He discusses and shares excerpts of his “Zulu Song Cycle” and the production “Hail to the King” about Dingane kaSenzangakhona.

Our third season centers South African Sound Cultures and is curated by our main host Dr. Layla Zami. In this episode, she is in conversation with multi-instrumentalist and composer Sky Dladla. Dladla speaks of her love for Indigenous Xhosa instruments, the intersection of traditional and contemporary performance culture, and her collaboration with artists such as Zolani Mahola. Recorded at Blueprint Studios in Johannesburg.

Season 2 closes with a conversation between Victoria Pham and Emma Lo. Victoria Pham introduces us to the many intersections of her work as an evolutionary biologist and artist. The conversation focuses on rhythm and listening in Pham’s research and practices, and Pham's and James Nguyen's open source project RE:SOUNDING.

This episode features Rully Shabara, an experimental vocalist based in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. Emma Lo talks with him about Xhabarabot Voice Machines, an ongoing project in which Shabara engineers interactive instruments from his own vocal samples. They discuss issues of consent in sampling, appropriation and self-exploitation, and open source technologies.