Futures of Listening

University of Aberdeen

In the midst of ever growing geopolitical and socioeconomic tensions both locally and internationally, is listening to the others ever possible? If we are hopeful that it is, how will our ways of listening need to change in the near future? In this new podcast series, join Professor Suk-Jun Kim and sound artist SHHE, as they bring together guests from across the globe to ask, ‘What can artists do to imagine and encourage such possible futures of listening?’ Futures of Listening is brought to you by the University of Aberdeen in collaboration with Sonica Glasgow.

Episodes

  1. May 21

    Futures of Listening with Radiophrenia

    In the four and final episode of Futures of Listening Season 1, we travelled to Glasgow, Scotland, and met with Mark Vernon and Stevie Jones from Radiophrenia, a Glasgow art radio collective. We discussed the birth of Radiophrenia, its ever-growing audience, and how it helped examine and reshape how we listen. - Mark Vernon is a Glasgow based sound artist who works with found tapes and acousmatic presence. His work explores themes of magnetic memory, audio archaeology, voyeurism and nostalgia. A rich collection of domestic tape recordings; audio letters, dictated notes, home sing-alongs, answer-phone messages and other lost voices often find their way into his unorthodox soundworlds. A keen advocate of radio as an art form, he is a founding member of Glasgow art radio collective, Radiophrenia. His solo music projects have been published through labels including Kye, Flaming Pines, Persistence of Sound, Entr’acte, Canti Magnetici and Gagarin records. Stevie Jones is a musician, sound artist, engineer and researcher based in Glasgow. From a background in post-rock, DIY and free-improv music scenes, he has collaborated extensively in dance, theatre and experimental film with organisations such as Scottish Dance Theatre, LUX and National Theatre of Scotland. He tours internationally with Arab Strap and is a member of improvising ensemble The New String Collective. Stevie co-directs and curates radio-art festival Radiophrenia and has had work broadcast on Wavefarm, Kunst Radio, WORM FM and the BBC’s Late Junction. He has performed at sound art festivals such as Counterflows, Sonica, Jupiter Rising, Wysing Arts Festival and Tectonics and recent releases includes work on Café OTO’s Takuroku, Chemikal Underground and Glasgow University’s 4-M. Stevie is in his 2nd year of a practice-based PhD in sonic arts at Glasgow University, researching experimental radio documentary and improvisatory, site-responsive performance.

    39 min

  2. Apr 23

    Futures of Listening with Shadwa Ali

    In the third episode of Futures of Listening, we are joined by Shadwa Ali, an independent multidisciplinary artist based in Alexandria, Egypt. Shadwa discusses her work and how listening informs and is informed by her sonic and visual works and their context, particularly, collective memory and behaviour. - Shadwa Ali is an independent multidisciplinary artist based in Alexandria. A graduate of the Faculty of Fine Arts at Alexandria University, her practice spans printmaking, installation, video, sound, and music. Shadwa's work explores societal issues and human psychology, with a particular focus on the chaotic rhythms of cities like Cairo and Alexandria and the impact of major events on collective memory and behavior. She draws attention to overlooked details and the absurdities of reality.   Her recent projects investigate the varying definitions of "noise" across capital cities, shaped by cultural differences. She views culture as a sonic tapestry, where musical notes thread through everyday life and humans act as instruments capable of reimagining the future. Shadwa has exhibited both in Egypt and internationally, and her work has been featured in international events and on radio programs.

    48 min

  3. Mar 26

    Futures of Listening with Robin Fox

    In the second episode of Futures of Listening, we are joined by Robin Fox, a composer and sound artist whose work has traversed from the punk squats of noise and improvised scenes to recent forays into orchestral composition for large scale contemporary dance works. Robin discusses how he started in musical and sonic arts practice, and in particular, his sound-light performance and installations since the early 2000s. Crisscrossing sound, visual, light and improvisation with technological exploration and curiosity, his focus always has been on listening. Robin also discusses the role and importance of alternative education in sound and music through MESS (Melbourne Electronic Sound Studio), a non-profit organisation that he founded to provide public access to electronic musical instruments and promote the preservation of rare and powerful instruments through active use. - Robin Fox is an internationally recognised audio-visual artist and composer whose work spans live performance, exhibitions, public art and composition for contemporary dance. His AV laser works, which synchronise sound & visual electricity in hyper-amplified 3D space have been performed in over 70 cities worldwide. His critically acclaimed performance work TRIPTYCH premiered at Unsound Krakow late 2022 and has toured extensively since with highlights including Berlin Atonal, Barbican (London), Ephemera (Warsaw) and the Lincoln Centre New York among many others. TRIPTYCH was awarded the Isao Tomita Special Prize for electronic music at Ars Electronica 2023. He is co-founder and Artistic Director of MESS.

    44 min

  4. Feb 19

    What is going to happen to the ways in which we listen?

    In this first episode of Futures of Listening, our co-hosts Professor Suk-Jun Kim and SHHE introduce the podcast series, share their own approaches to listening, and discuss why it is necessary for us to start exploring possible futures of our listening. - Suk-Jun Kim is a South Korean composer, sound artist and researcher and professor of electronic music and sound art at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland, UK. He has published two books, Humming (The Study of Sound) by Bloomsbury and Hasla by Kehrer Verlag Heidelberg. His research focuses on sound studies, immersive sound, phenomenological approaches to listening, electroacoustic music, space and place. Having been awarded first prizes in international electronic compositions, Kim was a resident composer at Artists-in-Berlin, DAAD, Germany (2009) and a Leverhulme visiting fellow at the University of Aberdeen (2010). In 2023, he initiated a large-scale sound studies and sound art project Futures of Listening by collaborating with the National Asian Culture Center (ACC) in South Korea and has led its Sound Lab Team. Between 2024-25, He is the Principal Investigator for Futures of Listening: Water Knowledge from Two Cities, an ISPF ODA challenge-oriented research project (2024-26) funded by the British Academy.   SHHE is the alias of Scottish-Portuguese sound artist, musician and producer, Su Shaw. Based in Dundee, her work explores themes of identity and connection at the intersection of sound and space, environment and ecology, and research and performance. Sound works, performances and installations have been presented at V&A Dundee co-commissioned by MSCTY Tokyo, Sonica Glasgow, Dundee Contemporary Arts, Edinburgh Festival, Celtic Connections, Summerhall, Radiophrenia (Scotland) and in Portugal, Iceland, Italy, Spain, Brazil, Egypt, and Iraq-Kurdistan.  Her eponymous debut album was released by One Little Independent Records and shortlisted for Scottish Album of the Year. Mini-album, ‘DÝRA’, was released in 2024. SHHE is a Cryptic Artist, alumna of Julie’s Bicycle Creative Climate Leadership programme and co-founder/producer of Dundee radio club.

    42 min
  • 4 Episodes

About

In the midst of ever growing geopolitical and socioeconomic tensions both locally and internationally, is listening to the others ever possible? If we are hopeful that it is, how will our ways of listening need to change in the near future? In this new podcast series, join Professor Suk-Jun Kim and sound artist SHHE, as they bring together guests from across the globe to ask, ‘What can artists do to imagine and encourage such possible futures of listening?’ Futures of Listening is brought to you by the University of Aberdeen in collaboration with Sonica Glasgow.

Information

  • Creator
    University of Aberdeen
  • Years Active
    2K
  • Episodes
    4
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © University of Aberdeen