Collective Ear

A pair of ears

Four Radio Plays for Deep Listeners, 2025

Produced by Barbara Preisig & Ronja Svaneborg in collaboration with Brand-New-Life Magazine

Sound is all about relationships. It is affected by the physical qualities of space and by the presence of others. By a body here, another there, and yet another over there. But can listening be shared? Talked about? Put into words? And when we try to do so, does one sound become many? Do many ears become one? Or does each person hear within their own unique sonic universe?

Is there always hearing where there is sound?

What shapes my listening? And what escapes my ear?

In each of the four episodes we introduce a piece of sound art that makes listening a subject. But unlike ordinary sound performances, “Collective Ear” frees you from the isolation of your headphones bubble and invites you to witness how other mindful ears listen.

Some say it’s not the sound that matters, but how we listen.

Join us, listen closely.

Episode 1: Can you listen like a beginner?

For 43 minutes, professional cellist Melody Giron plays Johann Sebastian Bach’s Cello Suite No.1 in G Major. Or rather – she plays parts of its prelude, over and over, searching for her tone. The ending never arrives. The beginning returns again and again, maintaining a state of perpetual preparation. Listen with us to Cally Spooner’s DEAD TIME (Melody’s Warm Up), 2022. Will you unlearn the melody? Can you listen like a beginner?

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Episode I is composed of fictional writing and collected fragments of conversations that took place on March 26, 2024, during The Poly Listening Club at Zurich University of the Arts. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or deceased (apart from the artists), may or may not be purely coincidental.

Sound piece: DEAD TIME (Melody’s Warm Up), 2022, by Cally Spooner
Texts: Barbara Preisig
Sound design: Ronja Svaneborg
Proofreading: Bram Opstelten
Speakers: Delphine Chapuis Schmitz, Mathieu Dafflon, Kris Decker, Alisha Dutt Islam, Emma Murray, Jarina Müller Frischkopf, Barbara Preisig, Alexander Prince Osei, Maria Rebecca Sautter, Ronja Svaneborg

Special thanks to:
Cally Spooner, the speakers, Felix Friedrich, Marcel Bleuler, Minda Deol, Laura von Niederhäusern, BA Fine Arts Theory II Class Spring 2024, and the participating audience