An interactive installation and instrument where opera singers and audience members can perform the aria “Darkness” – from The Cloud of Uknowing.
The Vocal Chorder allows performers to create music through pushing, leaning on, and bending wires.
The instrument were originally constructed when Carl was Artist in Residence at Den Anden Opera in Copenhagen, during March 2004. Carl had a vision of an interactive interface that would allow him to create accompaniment with the body, to make it possible for an opera singer to step outside the prevalent hierarchic structure of the operatic art. The singer/ interactor plays The Vocal Chorder by stretching, pulling, leaning on and manipulating the wires which in turn both controls the accompaniment and the blue pyramid floating on a black wall outside the installation. The Vocal Chorder has been developed in several different versions, where audience and performers can play the instrument in various ways.
CONCEPT AND INTERACTION DESIGN::
Carl and Åsa Unander-Scharin
MUSIC AND VOICE:
Carl Unander-Scharin
VISUAL ARTISTS:
Carl Unander-Scharin
TEXT:
Anonymous 14th c.
PRODUCTION OF THE FIRST VERSION VOCAL CHORDER:
Den Anden Opera, Copenhagen 2004
PRODUCTION OF THE CURRENT VERSION OF THE VOCAL CHORDER:
Carl and Åsa Unander-Scharin, Tobias Jaeger, Ludvig Elblaus 2022.
PERFORMANCES:
Den Anden Opera, Copenhagen 2004. Displayed in Malmö Konsthall (Sweden) 2004. ELD (Stockholm Sweden) 2004. The Dance Museum Stockholm (Sweden) 2004. Mälardalens Högskola, Västerås (Sweden) 2005. Inaugurated Stockholm New Music 2006, when the current Minister of Culture, Leif Pagrotsky, performed in it. Extended Opera Courses, Stockholm Reactor Hall (Sweden), 2015. 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013. Stockholm Royal Opera (Sweden). 2012. Cape Town Opera (South Africa) 2013, Scenkonstbiennalen Jönköping (Sweden) 2013. CHI2014 Toronto (Canada). Liszt Academy Budapest (Hungary), 2014. Performance in honour of Stephen Hawking, Stockholm Reactor Hall (Sweden), 2015. TEKLA-festival, Stockholm (Sweden), 2015. Utvandrarnas hus (The house of the emigrants), Växjö (Sweden) 2016. The Berwaldhall in Stockholm (Sweden) 2017. The Croatian National Opera in Rijeka (Croatia) 2019. Uppsala Domkyrka 2022.