Kirsten Reese

The composer and sound artist Kirsten Reese grew up in Hong Kong, the Philippines and the Rhineland and studied flute, electronic music and composition in Berlin and New York. She composes for electronic media, instruments, as well as for unusual perceptual situations, spaces, and speaker constellations (for example, in October 2019 at the Donaueschingen Music Festival, »Neglou«, a performative composition in a swimming pool for trumpet, underwater sound, and blurred actions that listeners could experience with their ears under the surface of the water). Research-intensive projects combine historical themes and archival recordings with field recordings and immersive soundscapes (»Cobourg«, 2019-21). Many works address aspects of "documentary composing" as well as composition with archives (such as »Atmende Kugel«, (2017), for six voices and Hermann Scherchen's rotating loudspeaker sphere). Kirsten Reese's interest in contextualizing media/media history and the specificity and aura of media instruments is reflected in »Light Green Rituals« for historical Fairlight Synthesizer and ensemble (2018) and »the lightest words had the weight of oracles« (2014/16) for Fairlight CMI and electric guitar. Another focus lies on compositions, installations and audio walks for landscapes and urban outdoor spaces (»Berlin Rosenthaler Platz«, (2018), audio walk with singing sirens).

Kirsten Reese teaches electroacoustic composition at the Berlin University of the Arts (UdK).