LISTENING ARTS CHANNEL
FIVE HAIKU
Five Haiku is a series of short audio-only soundwalks which you're invited to join at dawn. Each Haiku episode last approximately 20 minutes and will involve listeners getting out of their homes for a short walk and listening, guided and accompanied by shakuhachi player Laonikos. You are invited to take a soundwalk in their neighbourhood at dawn while listening to a livestream of shakuhachi music, ending with a recitation of a haiku by Basho, selected for that particular morning.
These sessions will be like a bell which “rings” and tethers us to the change of the seasons and the lengthening of the day in springtime. Shakuhachi music is not defined by consistency of pitch and rhythm, but by blending the musical and the non-musical, inviting the sounds of the breath and imperfections in the construction of the instrument into its aesthetic. By letting those sounds in, we open up possibilities for listening to the world around us in different ways, and embracing that which we cannot control but can only witness.
LAONIKOS PSIMIKAKIS-CHALKOKONDILIS is a shakuhachi player based in London. He is a trained wilderness guide and seeks to explore the overlap between music and his experiences of the Finnish wilderness. He believes listening is an active practice that can help us to connect to and understand each other and the world around us. He is fascinated by shakuhachi music because it invites unintentional, non-musical sounds into its aesthetics and is thus a metaphor for how we can learn to accept, appreciate, and be compassionate towards the non-human world. Originally from Greece, he lived in Finland for six years where he fell in love with the wilderness, snow, and saunas, and he now lives in London.
Twitter: @laonikoss
Instagram: @laonikoss
Facebook: fb.com/laonikoss
SoundCloud: soundcloud.com/laonikoss