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music: october 25

— 2 min read

I had been waiting for it most of the summer.

The Venice Biennale Musica closing weekend, curated by Caterina Barbieri around the idea of "cosmic music" as the generative power to create new worlds. Three days of experimental performances across Venice. The weather was beautiful, and I had spent most of October preparing, listening more intentionally, reaching for music that demanded attention – less background, more focus.

Here are my favorite performances from the festival:

Venice Biennale Musica

FUJI|||||||||||TA's Resonant Vessel was my favorite performance of the festival. Air pumped into water tanks reminded me of old sci-fi sound-effects – think Alien and Blade Runner. He wrote sound calligraphically, where small gestures changed everything. Later he bowed metal surfaces, then sampled and looped the results. The sounds FUJI|||||||||||TA created were unique, unlike anything I'd heard before. I could easily imagine a beat layered over them, driving people to move. Everything flowed together – it was improvisational and at the same time precise. Very impressive.

Morgana's Before Darkness Gated Us reminded me of Autechre's live performances, but with more signal failure and less beat. Digital glitches and stutters caused everything to collapse. Sometimes a beat nearly formed and people began to nod, but it collapsed into static again. Glitch and noise left no references to hold onto. The mood was intentionally uncomfortable, which seemed intentional. The tension between craving rhythm and being denied it created its own energy.

Moor Mother, Aho Ssan, Simon Sieger, and Aquilles Navarro performed Shinkolobwe, charged with anger from the first moment. They took everyone on a journey – to the Shinkolobwe uranium mine in Congo, to Hiroshima, Nagasaki, through radiation sickness and death. People stood completely still. The air felt thick with shock and terror, which erupted into free-jazz chaos and explosions of sound. I never thought a human voice could do what's usually reserved for visual media – Moor Mother painted scenes and made you feel the weight of history in your own body. The audience was shaking.

A few more performances stood out. Sunn O))) was overwhelming in a different way – purely physical, waves of sound travelling like an earthquake. Earplugs couldn't stop the pressure hitting your body from all sides. Agnese Menguzzato created calm, pulsating sequences through guitar, the whole thing feeling interstellar. The Kamigaku Ensemble built a layered sound that evoked the Shepard tone effect: tension rising forever, without release. Enrico Malatesta drew astonishing range out of just two cymbals and violin bows. Lucy Railton's cello held single pitches for minutes, each note shifting like a tide. And Ecco2k's ambient dreamy DJ set closed things out softly.

Recommendations

Beyond the Biennale, I listened to more music from my backlog and these releases stood out: