The 15th anniversary edition of Rewire sprang into life yesterday across The Hague. The day kicked off with a performance from participants of the Collaborative Music Creation course (KC). They opened Rewire’s context programme at West Den Haag’s Alphabetum, which was soon followed by conversations and listening sessions. This involved a conversation between the artists of Proximity Music: The Ongoing Hum – Rewire’s annual exhibition hosted in collaboration with iii which also opened today and is freely accessible all weekend, even for non-Pass holders. The discussions wrapped up with Actress and Suzanne Ciani, who shared about their collaboration in anticipation of their performance of Concrète Waves later that evening.

Meanwhile, master’s students of Non Linear Narrative (KABK) presented their collective exploration of sound, storytelling, and interaction in the form of installations and live performances across West Den Haag. Elsewhere in the city, the context programme hosted sound walks, listening sessions, and installations, including In Transit by Eva Aguilar, Jekaterina Viltšenko, Laura Häberli, Laura Spichtig, Paul Schmidt and Yonca Yildirim (Sonology, KC), and Remnants of Conversations by Isobel Nicholl, Yağmur (Yago) Sağlam, Elen Zhou, and Niklas Ehret (Cultural Analysis, UvA).

As the evening sky slowly blanketed The Hague, visitors began gathering around Amare, where the opening concert brought swells of serene and stunning music – truly setting the stage for the weekend to come. The programme began with the world premiere of Caterina Barbieri & ONCEIM, where the beloved Italian composer and artist’s vivid modular synthesis had new life breathed into it through the stirring timbres and orchestral ingenuity of ONCEIM – the Orchestra of New Musical Creation, Experimentation, and Improvisation. After a short break, Barbieri returned to the stage with some guest musicians and with accompanying visuals from MFO to delve deeper into her deeply intuitive synth compositions.

Soon after the rapturous applause for Barbieri had dissipated into a murmuring of voices, speaking both hushedly and giddily in anticipation of what was to come, the house lights darkened once more. Sitting opposite one another, separated by their towering rigs of synths and cables, producer Darren J. Cunningham, aka Actress and Suzanne Ciani, an icon and early pioneer of electronic music composition, enveloped the audience in a wave of bubbling ambience and swashes of percussion. They closed out the evening by bringing the crashing shore to Amare’s Concertzaal in an unforgettable performance.

Photos by Alex Heuvink, Charlotte van der Gaag, Jan Rijk, Parcifal Werkman, and Pieter Kers