Lumen were asked by Kiff Bamford and Harold Offeh of Leeds Beckett University to provide the sound equipment installation for artist Rana Hamadeh‘s live sound play/peformance at The Tetley in Leeds, as part of the symposium ‘Performance and Uncertainty’. The performance is titled ‘Can You Make a Pet of Him Like a Bird or Put Him on a Leash For Your Girls?’.

The intention was to create an immersive and almost quite harsh sound environment, utilising the whole space of The Tetley’s South Bank room. The artwork featured 8 channels of discrete audio along with 3 live microphones, played back through 8 different speakers. The speakers used were two large subwoofers, six PA speakers, a small speaker facing the wall and a public address horn all fed from a laptop and audio interface, with mixing by audio engineer Joe Osborne of Lumen.

The performance itself was very powerful and moving, with live oration, singing and sound effects at high volumes. Earplugs were provided for the audience just in case!