A Garden of Forking Paths – Finale 2

“A Garden of Forking Paths” opens a window of time into a relational field of sound sources – concerts, listening stations, sound installations – that connects pasts and presents from multiple places around the world. The art of field recording lies at the heart of the final weekend of MaerzMusik – Festival for Time Issues 2022. Under the continued impact of the pandemic, “A Garden of Forking Paths – Finale” takes the place of the festival’s closing event “The Long Now” and migrates into the urban space around Nettelbeckplatz in Berlin/Wedding.

Six locations, including Nettelbeckplatz itself, are simultaneously open on 26 and 27 March 2022 – a constellation of interconnected places to be visited with each relating differently to sounds from the world we inhabit. From electronic live performances of artists working with field recordings and sound installations to unaltered acoustic time capsules, and encounters of relocated sonic realities embedded in the soundscape of Wedding, this project moves into a sonic zone of acoustic ecology.

The Betonhalle at silent green, MaerzMusik’s festival hub, is its beating heart, offering live concerts by electronic artists working with field recordings; the octagonal space of silent green’s Kuppelhalle hosts sound installations to be immersed in; Atelier 2 of silent green becomes a listening station that gives space to a plurality of soundscape approaches considering their temporal situatedness; SAVVY Contemporary invites single listeners to encounter a one-on-one relation with sound; Nettelbeckplatz bears witness to sounds from entirely different realities in the world; and Cashmere Radio, finally, offers a place and a frequency in which these layers of sonic experience meet and flow together.

As part of “A Garden of Forking Paths – Finale 2”, an Ukraine Fund Raising concert will take place in the concrete hall of silent green on Sunday, 27 March at 12:00. The joint initiative with ensemble mosaik will present works by Martyna Poznańska as well as Anna Korsun, Alexej Kokhanov and Stefan Streich, among others, together with other contemporary music ensembles from Berlin - harmonic space orchestra, Maulwerker, Solistenensemble Kaleidoskop and Zafraan Ensemble.

The admission is free. Cash donations will be collected on site and donations to a specially set up account (Wir packen's an; GLS Bank; IBAN DE46 4306 0967 1059 2396 02) will be requested. These will benefit the Brandenburg association “Wir packen's an e.V.”, which organises music education projects for children and young people traumatised by war and flight.

“A Garden of Forking Paths” opens MaerzMusik 2022 at the Gropius Bau, and another closes the festival – an invitation to enter relational encounters through, in and with sound, space and time.