Chamber Made have long been shaking up Melbourne’s performing arts scene, constantly challenging and surprising audiences with what live art can entail, particularly in the realms of music, sound, and contemporary performance. Their latest project, Listening Acts, was a series of works - some live, some recorded - that reshape how we respond to aural experiences and technology, and how these elements connect to memory and identity. The three live performances in this program each carve out a distinct realm, yet together, they form a fluid, thought-provoking journey through acoustic textures that pushes the boundaries between audience and performance.
Aviva Endean's Tactile Piece for Human Ears is an exquisite meditation on sound and perception. Three binaural dummy heads, equipped with microphones, “hear” audio created via the custom ‘Hear Muffs’ that twist and transform the way we normally process sounds. These altered waves are then streamed directly to each audience member’s Bluetooth headphones. In the opening moments, Endean covers the dummy head’s ears, and the resulting noise feels like I'm rushing through the sky with the wind blowing in my face. It presents an invitation to enter with a clean slate and simply exist in the present as Endean interacts with the heads, generating a variety of sounds.
The second work, Song to the Cell by Biddy Connor, is a duet by human and machine. Connor performs alongside an IV machine and a Doppler ultrasound, their beeps, hums, and rhythms echoing the sounds she came to know intimately during her cancer treatment in 2020. Connor pairs this with her voice, bringing melody and words into the mechanical, transforming clinical tones into something tender and human. What begins as a memory of illness becomes a contemplation on reliance, fragility, and survival, and the strange dependency we share with the machines that keep us alive.
Closing the triptych is Alexandra Spence’s sounding forms / forming sounds, which uses sinewaves to show how sound can be felt as much as heard. These pure waves ripple through custom perspex instruments and drum skins, setting them into vibrations and turning tones into movement. While Spence starts her piece solo, it gradually expands as Connor and Endean join in, first on violin and clarinet, then on the perspex and drums, building a captivating choreography of space, objects, and bodies.
Listening Acts is an opportunity to think differently about what it means to listen. Each work stands individually, but together they move between quiet intimacy and a shared moment. Sometimes you’re tucked away in your headphones, lost in your own world of sound; at other times, you’re aware of everyone else listening with you. Sound is not just something we hear, but something we can feel, as it travels through space and intersects with technology, letting Chamber Made craft moments where sound pulses inside us, not just into us.
Listening Acts was performed at the Melbourne Recital Centre between 22 - 24 August 2025.
Image credit: Sarah Walker
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