COMPOSING SOUND ART AND SOUND DESIGN
FOR PERFORMING ARTS
Styx Lament (Pop-up exhibition) (2024)
Julia Adzuki presents her ongoing project Styx Lament which is an embodied investigation of ecological grief in relation to the Styx Forest in Lutruwita Tasmania, made in collaboration with Patrick Dallard, Tomas Björkdal and 14 Tasmanian artists, activists and academics.
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Concept, choreography, text and voice: Anna Asplind
Headphone composition: Tomas Björkdal
In collaboration with:
Playwright: Christopher Bocker
Musician: Anna Karlsson
Author: Lars Andersson.
Voice actors: Leif Persson and Carina Ekman.
Photo: Anna Asplind
Weld Extended (2023)
Choreographer Virpi Pahkinen has worked with dancer William Nylind in a solo format. The invitation to the choreographer was to share his practice and create choreographic material linked to 12 minutes of music composed by Swedish composer Tomas Björkdal.
Choreography: Virpi Pahkinen
Dancer: William Nylind
Composition: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Virpi Pahkinen
An exhibition about the big questions in life.
We have given meaning to death in different ways and created rites to deal with grief and wonder. In the exhibition Existence, the World Culture Museum addresses these questions through different cultures from different parts of the world.
Producer: Johan Rödström
Sounddesign: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Världskulturmuseet
"What happens if we stand in the gap between what we can and what we cannot decipher?"
"Two dancers investigate how digitization affects our bodies and our gestures take on new meanings in the time paradox of parallel worlds."
Concept, choreography and performer: Ulrika Larsen and Magdi Beky Winnerstam
Composition/sounddesign and video projections: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Styx Lament is a performance ritual that took place in clear-felled and old-growth forest in the Styx Valley, Lutruwita / Tasmania, in November 2019
Concept: Julia Adzuki
Multichannel sound: Tomas Björkdal
Video art/documentation: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
In the interactive performance installation, Karolin Kent and Tuva Hildebrand invite the visitor to practice collective repair.
Choreography & performer: Tuva Hildebrand & Karolin Kent
Concept: Tuva Hildebrand & Karolin Kent
Composition for headphones and room: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Karolin Kent
Dans performance with multichannel sound.
" A sound and movement installation where we examine the darkness and the importance of the night for living things. Through the soundscape, we are transported to the dark nature where eyes and ears, sense buds and emotional bodies alert us in the night".
Director and choreography: Katja Seitajoki
Multichannel composition: Tomas Björkdal
Dansers: Ellen Söderhult, Noah Hellwig och Lisen Pousette
Photo: José Figueroa
A concert with multichannel sound-improvisation performed at Timescape garden, Syltenberget during The cultural night of Norrköping.
Inspired by the project of making a biodiversity micropark/wildflower garden on Norrköping’s Syltenberget.
Concept: Anna Asplind
Multichannel sound improvisation: Tomas Björkdal
Video projection: Tomas Björkdal
Film/Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Link: https://www.regiondalarna.se/verksamhet/kultur-och-bildning/verksamhetsomraden/bild-och-form/lager-pa-lager/
Concept, choreography, text and voice: Anna Asplind
Headphone composition: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Multi-channel, live-mix composition performed at
Antenn Sound Art Festival, Ljudtornet, Gnesta.
The audio source is from squeaking wooden parts in an old wooden house.
Multichannel composition and video art: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Art installation of Helena, Hildur W with big scale projections at Gnesta watertower.
Concept and paintings: Helena Hildur W
Multichannel composition/installation: Tomas Björkdal & Erik peters
Film/Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Outdoors Multi channel sound, performance and dance for children
Concept and choreography: Katja Seitajoki
Multichannel composition: Tomas Björkdal
Voice: Bengt CW Carlsson
Photo: José Figueroa
The Shit Project, Fungus Kingdom, Gnesta
Soundwalk with headphones.
Poetry and soundscape transport you through the drains underground, through river systems, history and bacterial life beyond our bodies.
Poetry and voice: Julia Adzuki
Soundscape composition: Tomas Björkdal
Film/Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Performance, The Helsingör version
A performance/installation on consumption and communication,
as well as consumption of communication.
Concept: Nordic Trash
Director: Brigitte Christensen
Composition and video art: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Charlotte Calberg
Live-composition with guitars and amplifiers.
Antenn Sound Art Festival, Ljudtornet Gnesta
Live-composition: Tomas Björkdal
Video art: Tomas Björkdal (one of Ljudtornets artistic directors)
Film/Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Performance, Långsjö Teater, Gnesta
Richard II and the future is an honest discussion in blank verse in two acts about hope, decay and the importance of art in the light of a system shift.
Director: Maria Magdolna Beky Winnerstam
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Dans performance, 3e Våningen, Gothenburg
Almost Out of Sight consists of repeated, patterns, rhythms and movements. These can be perceived as a backwards spell in front of being where the vision was free, open and clear. Now it is foggy and our senses must be sharpened so as not to get lost again.
Choreography: Anna Koch
Composition: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Performance for children, Uusi Teatteri, Stockholm
All my homes is a show where the friends twist and turn the concept of "home" with the help of play, movement, superpowers and living cartoon characters.
Director: Katja Seitajoki
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Kai Kangassalo
Sound installation at Antenn Sound Art Festival, Gnesta
Concept and Installation, Ljudtornet, Gnesta
Ljudtornet (The sound tower) is a not-for-profit organisation and platform for experiemental sound, art and music that takes place in the old watertower in Gnesta, with an annual festival ANTENN and other events.
Photo: Julia Adzuki
A dance performance that celebrates the 50th anniversary of contact improvisation and one of its founders Nancy Stark Smith!
Professional dancers and a dance philosopher in the form of improvisation investigate the laws of gravity and communicate through touch, radical autonomy, and collective consciousness.
Concept and curator: Tuva Hildebrand
Live improvision with contact-microphones: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Johannes Tegnér
Dear Earthling is an interactive one-to-one performance, guiding you through a ritual to bring you closer to nature’s cycles of life, death and transformation
part of Anna Asplinds Dancewalk series. A place specific choreograhy with headphone composition.
Concept: Tuva Hildebrnd
Multichannel composition: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Olle Enqvist
A performance/installation on consumption and communication,
as well as consumption of communication.
Performance, The Gnesta version
Concept: Nordic Trash
Multichannel composition and video art: Tomas Björkdal
Film/Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Art exhibition of Carina Marklund at Konstfrämjandet Sörmland
Concept and art: Carina Marklund
Composition: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Johanna Törnqvist
The Shit Project, Fungus Kingdom, Gnesta
Outdoors multichannel voice composition
Shitopia is a spoken choir piece, with text extracted from the scientific report ‘Gnissel i Maskineriet’ (Screech in the Machinery) written by Björn Wallsten, Malin Ideland, Tora Holmberg och Sebastian Abrahamsson.
Voice: Julia Adzuki
Text: Karin Lindström Kolterud
Multichannel composition: Tomas Björkdal
Film/Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Sound installation at Antenn Sound Art Festival, Gnesta
Concept and Installation, Ljudtornet, Gnesta
Multiple tape recorders, microphones and extended tape loops interacts with
the audience and performers during Antenn sound festival.
Ljudtornet (The sound tower) is a not-for-profit organisation and platform for experiemental sound, art and music that takes place in the old watertower in Gnesta, with an annual festival ANTENN and other events.
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Concept, choreography, text and voice: Anna Asplind
Headphone composition: Tomas Björkdal
Composition/installation
Rural movement, Unexpected Movements, Sjösala
Artistic project manager: Anna Asplind
Composition: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Anna Asplind
Performance at KTH Reaktorhallen, Stockholm
The world of the URKs is a immersive performing arts experience, which places the audience at the center of the action. Together with the show's underground characters, visitors find themselves up on stage, where they move freely among sounding pipe instruments, film projections, circus performers and musicians. The story unfolds under, over, between and around them.
Långsjö Teater, Gnesta
Director: Maria Magdolna Beky Winnerstam
Soundmix and projections: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: David Winnerstam
Place specific performance with headphones
Love walks is a choreographed walk outdoors in the city.
We are guided through inner rooms and through rooms for meeting others.
In specific situations around love, we examine together what love can be and how love can arise.
Concept: Mold
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdall (a part of Mold)
Photo: Trinidad Carillo
Headphone-performance at Antenn Sound Art Festival, Gnesta
Inspired by the water who still runs under and through the old watertower.
Concept: Ljudtornet
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Ta det piano, Antenn Sound Art Festival, Gnesta
Multi-channel, live-mix composition performed at
Antenn Sound Art Festival, Ljudtornet, Gnesta.
The audio source is from an old shipp piano.
Multi-channel composition and Video art: Tomas Björkdal
Film/Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Choreographed place specific sound installation with headphones.
By camouflaging themselves in the swamp, the participant gets to investigate the flora and fauna as well as all the swamp's mysterious sounds and movements. We ask whether, by camouflaging oneself as an animal, an insect or a plant, one can approach nature and challenge the perspectives that give man dominion over nature. In a time of climate challenges, we unite artistic, scientific and philosophical perspectives in a choreographed sound installation.
Concept and director: Katja Seitajoki
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Film/Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Teater Galeasen, Stockholm
"How is individual development affected in a structure that is created to protect the image of the "perfect" family?"
Text: Christina Ouzounidis
Director: Natalie Ringler
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Foto: Mats Bäcker
Sound & light installetion at Culture night in Kvarnbyn, Gothenburg
Concept: Tomas Björkdal and Johan Rödström
Sound: Tomas Björkdal
Light and video: Johan Rödström
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Teater Galeasen, Stockholm
About Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale och Edith Bouvier Beale.
Text: Sara Stridsberg
Director: Richard Günther
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Dan Hansson
Concept, choreography, text and voice: Anna Asplind
Headphone composition: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Performance.
The Ecological Theatre at The Biological Museum, Stockholm
In Between Bodies (Kroppar i mellanrum) is a part of the project
The Ecological Theatre (Den Ekologiska Teatern)
"In Between Bodies springs from a 6 hours long performance which took place inside the habitat diorama during Kulturnatten 25th of April 2015. The practice is developed throughout the time spent inside the exhibition, a constructed reality created by Gustaf Kolthoff and Bruno Liljefors."
Concept: Anna Asplind and Daniel AlmgrenRecén
Live composition: Tomas Björkdall
Foto: André Wunstorf
DEEKTE is a part of the project The Ecological Theatre (Den Ekologiska Teatern) and is an art and performance evening at the Biological Museum in Stockholm during the Culture Night in Stockholm.
"Art installations, landscapes of sound and light, readings and dancers who move among the stuffed animals infront of impressive backdrops painted by the famous naturalistic artist Bruno Liljefors."
Concept: Anna Asplind and Daniel AlmgrenRecén
Live composition: Tomas Björkdall
Foto: André Wunstorf
Concept, choreography, text and voice: Anna Asplind
Headphone composition: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Performance, MDT, Atalante and Dansstationen
NEAR THAT PLACE is a performance that tries to create its own reality. It takes its origin in the questions of belonging, home and memory in relation to nomadism. What does it mean to belong to a place, an environment, a social context when mobility has become the norm?
Concept: Daniel Almgren Rec'en and Johan Forsman
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Märta Thisner
Kulturhuset Stadsteatern, Stockholm
Text: Lars Norén
Director: Hugo Hansén
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Petra Hellberg
20 000 m2 choreographed GPS place specific sound installation with headphones. at Mostigshällarna, Söderhamn
Swedish Prison Museum Gävle
Past and present intertwine, history is actualized and creates connections in time and space. The work raises questions about ideologies, beliefs, fears of the unknown and state violence, but also a dream of a hostel and a lookout tower.
Concept, text and voice: Anna Asplind
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Film/Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Performance at Uferstudios, Berlin
NEAR THAT PLACE is a performance that tries to create its own reality.It takes its origin in the questions of belonging, home and memory in relation to nomadism.What does it mean to belong to a place, an environment, a social context when mobility has become the norm?
Concept: Daniel Almgren Rec'en and Johan Forsman
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Diego
Headphone composition
Döden - En utställning om livet, Liljevalchs, Stockholm
Concept och text: Anna Koch
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo:
Festival:Display, Rotundan, The Royal Swedish Opera, Stockholm
Chorography and dancer: Anna Koch
Sound: Tomas Björkdal
Place specific performance with headphones
M M M is a choreographed walk outdoors through the forrest.
M M M - Mat Mata Matas is an choreographed outdoor performance that takes place at dusk. "I am guided through the forest. I attend the performance. I will be shown care during my visit. I will be in the forest and I will be part of the forest.
I know that M M M is about food. I will be fed. I'm ready."
Concept: Mold
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal (a part of Mold)
Interactive sound installation at The Biological Museum, Stockholm
The Ecological Theatre at The Biological Museum, Stockholm
In Between the layers is a part of the project
The Ecological Theatre (Den Ekologiska Teatern)
"The visitors move through a soundscape of text and sound that changes in relation to their own movement and direction in the room. The experience of the museum is given a new dimension where its history and the present moments reflections are co-existing."
Concept: Anna Asplind and Daniel AlmgrenRecén
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdall
Foto: André Wunstorf
Performance, Skogen
"Have a seat. Please lie down. Feel free to sleep."
"Sömnen är på en gång det mest utsatta av tillstånd och en politisk handling, en provokation och en ofrånkomlig del av vår natur. Sömnen påminner om en cyklisk tillvaro, som en modern och rationell samtid vill övervinna, och bjuder därmed motstånd mot ett instrumentellt förnuft och en konsumism utan gränser." - Jesper Olsson
Concept: Mold
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal (part of Mold)
Photo: Film/foto: Tomas Björkdal
Teater Galeasen, Stockholm
"The play is an existential drama about our search for permanence. It is also an elegant comedy with a dark undertone. About the big life audit, about our difficulties living in relationships."
Text: Ivan Vyrypaev
Director: Olof Hanson
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Dan Hansson
Performance, Skogen, Gothenburg
"Vi låter restaurang Kinesiska Muren bli vår portal till en av stadens osynliga berättelser. Genom att träda in i rummet rör vi oss från stadsrummets anonymitet ner i det specifika och personliga. I en buss tar vi oss sedan ut mot skogen; från det fysiska och fasta, till en plats där stadens arkitektur och vi själva för ett ögonblick svävar fritt."
Concept: Johan Forsman and Johan Rödström
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Higab/Hans Wretling
Performance, Skogen, Gothenburg
"Come. Now you die. But don't be afraid. You return"
Concept: Mold
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal (part of Mold)
Photo: Johan Rödström
Kulturhuset Stadsteatern, Stockholm
Text: Ulrika Kärnborg
Director: Hugo Hansén
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Petra Hellberg
Kulturhuset Stadsteatern, Stockholm
Text: Ingmar Bergman
Director: Hugo Hansén
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Carl Thorborg
Dans performance
Aktör & vänner and Atalante, Gothenburg
"A fleeing dream, the glittering diva, the little one and I rocked in rhythm and out of rhythm with the noise of life outside. It was now, here and then that it happened, that matters forever."
Concept and dans: Gilda Stillbäck
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Performance
Inkonst, Malmö
Concept: Arena Baubo
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: José Figueroa
Performance
Teater Tribunal, Stockholm
Concept: Arena Baubo
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: José Figueroa
Performance
Dramalabbet, Stockholm
Concept: Arena Baubo
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: José Figueroa
Performance
Stockholm Academy of Dramatic Arts
"On a warm summer night, in a high-rise concrete building, five people cross each other's paths."
Text: Roland Schimmelpfennig
Director: Rasmus Lindgren
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Chris Erlback
Kulturhuset Stadsteatern, Stockholm
Text: Peter Weiss
Director: Hugo Hansén
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Mikaela Westerholm
Performance
Stockholm Academy of Dramatic Arts
Director: Hugo Hansén
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Performance, Skogen, Gothenburg
"For some time we have investigated the preschool as a place and structure, and with Grodden as our starting point, we are now embarking on a journey through the preschool's rituals and routines."
"The orders of reality are displaced and create entrances to a different experience of the city."
Concept: Johan Forsman and Johan Rödström
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Iris Piers
Performance, Skogen and Weld, Stockholm
"Weld is moved and takes shape as a shadowy imprint in the middle of the forest. In a bus we get out of the city together. Once there, the theater's social ritual is staged in an empty space where the art and we are allowed to float freely for a moment.."
Concept: Johan Forsman and Johan Rödström
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo:
Performance at Sjömanskyrkan
Aktör & vänner, Gothenburg
"Visitors are taken, one by one, through a subtle throng of memories, interpretations and analyzes generated by the house."
Concept: Johan Forsman and Johan Rödström
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Tomas Björkdal
Performance
Aktör & vänner, Gothenburg
"Register for a performance that makes you sick; be part of simulated symptoms, enjoy our careful treatment and take the full road to convalescence, spa department and registering out. Welcome to The Central Clinic!"
Concept: Johan Rödström and Johan Forsman
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Oskar Allerby
Installation, performance, multimedia, dans inspired by Hamlet.
Aktör & vänner and The Bitte Wartencollective, Gothenburg
"The curtain will not rise, there will be no beginning, middle, end, and no applause."
Concept: Aktör & vänner
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Performance
"The audience is invited to a contemplative and playful journey that takes place in a huge greenhouse. The journey leads to both inside, outside and the outer space. The journey-mates will be a bunch of insects, thirsty for love."
Concept: Johan Forsman and Johan Rödström
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Kulturhuset Stadsteatern, Stockholm
Text: Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Director: Hugo Hansén
Sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Elisabeth Ohlson Wallin
Teater VästerNorrland, Sundsvall
Text: Rasmus Lindgren
Director: Rasmus Lindgren
Composition and sound design: Tomas Björkdal
Photo: Lia Jacobi