Virtual New Year’s with Fidget

Hello everyone, we wanted to take a moment to say hi, wish you a happy holiday and new year! Listening Bodies did not offer any in-person workshops this year, but we were creating videos, online experiences, and planning for the future. 
The first thing we wanted to share with you this holiday season is the “Meditation on Light” written by Monica Gentile (read by Michael in English and Italian by Monica). It’s a lovely guided meditation exploring the sensorial nature of light during this deep wintertime.
Also while we were in Philadelphia for several months this spring, due to the pandemic, we were happy to live near and spend time with the wonderful dance/media company known as Fidget. This year Fidget will be hosting a Virtual New Year’s Eve Party called Age of Aquarius co-hosted by Forbidden Fruit. Listening Bodies will premiere a new video dance piece we created called “A Song the Earthworm Sang”. This piece is dedicated to Deep Listening founded by Pauline Oliveros and is a reference to a poem she wrote called “The Earthworm Also Sings” found in her Anthology of Text ScoresPlease consider purchasing a ticket to raise a toast and enjoy hours of art and entertainment for this virtual party in the comfort of your own space.

You can view the video we shared here:

Sending you love and light for a happy 2021,
Monica and Michael

H E L I O S T Ā S I O

I am very pleased to share with the world a collaborative album with French ambient pop artist, Wild Anima. Heliostāsio stands for the balance of the sun by ancient Greeks to describe the solstice. This ambient album is the outcome of an impromptu live jam session when I was in residency at GlogauAIR in Berlin.
Inspired by our own individual stays in Iceland this album paints a multi-layered soundscape standing in between night and day and time and matter. Translating this infinite yet ephemeral moment found in the dance of the celestial bodies, where shadow and light slip softly in between the rhythms of nature and the cosmos. The spaces in between, dawn and dusk, solstices, and equinoxes. Recurring patterns yet never the same.

Weimar Workshop / Bauhaus.fm

I had a wonderful time co-leading a two-week workshop with the sound studies students at Bauhaus-Universität Weimar in Germany. We had a deep and expressive time exploring Deep Listening, Field Recording, and Sonic Art with a very gifted and interesting group of students.

I also had the privilege to discuss my work on their radio station over at Bauhaus.fm on the show called “Every Dreaming Body is a Listener?!” with Brandon LaBelle. You can find a recording of the conversation on their website (in English).