Debate: Artistic Intent versus Audience Perception

Welcome back to the Sonic Days podcast. This episode is a live debate from Sonic Days 2025 on artistic intent and audience perception. The debate takes place the day after two immersive concerts were held with Sonic College's 160-speaker immersive setup spread throughout the entire building. Enjoy.

Okay, then we're ready for the next debate here in the track about uh new concert formats. I'm Bikit Vollmann I'm uh head of research at Sonic College, and I want to welcome Martin Ronhansen who is um the head of the rhythmic concert venue Gosel here in Kohling. Jens Christiansen aka Rompistol, and then here on my left side I have uh some of our brilliant students.

All our students are, of course, brilliant, but uh here we have uh Adam uh Hill Jensen and Morten Baumholt and Oskar. So we're going to discuss issues about these uh kind of new concert formats like we did yesterday in the atrium. At the core of that is actually this uh split between being an uh creative artist composing for new concert formats or performing uh in new concert formats and then how it's it is perceived by the audience.

And I want to start with uh just a very open question for everybody. Why is it that we need to have new concert formats? And I don't know who wants to start, but I know that Goset has this kind of track about new concert formats, so I would maybe say that you could start uh Martin on that one.

So the I'm from Gosset. We are a relatively uh small venue, we have a 700 capacity room and uh 350 seated, and uh we are like a factory. We we do concerts like productions, and we um we're really good at that, but at the same time we can also see that other types of venues or other types of entertainment are expanding how they they are developing their business.

And I think that it's quite important for a music venue like ours to do something as well. And for me, it's about uh curiosity and looking into what are the technical options and how do I uh perceive the audience. I guess that we have an audience where the attention span is getting shorter and shorter, and we just keep on producing concert formats which is uh 90 minutes long, and I guess we should do something about that.

And maybe some of these uh immersive things can do something about how we uh attack that challenge. And the thing we can do as a venue is to create a space where the artists actually have time and room to try stuff out, so that's uh what we are doing at Goshut.

Okay. Um I will wait a little bit with you, Jens. Uh I'll get back to you because you were the performer yesterday. Uh, and I will uh give the microphone to you, Oscar, because what do you think about these uh formats that you saw yesterday?

I think uh yesterday the uh the format quite different from a nor normal concert format because I found that audience and artist almost became more fluid in a way because as a a part of the audience I was uh able to move around listen differently at different spaces and the focal point was in the middle instead of at the back of a room where it usually is.

So I found that uh these uh new ways of um having concerts and experiencing concerts is uh very beneficial to or it's a way to listen to the music differently than normal, just go in, there's the artist, and that's it. I felt like I was almost a part of it. So it's more involving and more I think I was more even more moved by the music as well during those two concerts yesterday.

So I found that the music was actually just new and inspiring, and maybe even better than in a normal classic concert.

So kind of an extra layer, yeah, definitely.

Yeah.

Okay, we will get back to the technical part and the mixing part in a while. But I would like to hand the microphone to you, Jens. How was it then to experience and do your concert in this particular place yesterday?

Um it was a very different experience, I have to say, but also really nice. Also a bit confusing because you have the audience all around you in like a 360. It's like when you're used to standing on a stage and having the audience in that like the same direction. I don't know. I'm also like I've been playing live for the last two decades, and it's mostly been that traditional stage.

And you look down at the audience and you have them there. And whereas yesterday, I didn't really know where to look when I was engaging with people when I was talking to them. So that's one thing, but that's also a nice thing because it brings you out of your comfort zone a little bit, like also what Oscar says about you know, being brought out of your comfort zone as a spectator can do something to you.

It it it gives some uh fragility that is um interesting to explore, I think. Yeah.

So, in a way, it's less like the person, like the performer who is engaging, but more the music. Can can can I put it like that?

Yeah, and then with with this uh speaker system, we had like five floors of speakers, and the sound engineers were also playing with the balancing of the tracks. I gave you the freedom to to do some um stereo pannings and like I don't know what it's called when it's multi-speaker panning, but it's not it's more than stereo, right?

And I actually, when we did the sound check, I actually had to tell you to uh not do it on the ground floor because I was like freaking out. I couldn't I couldn't hear what I was doing, and I'm also because I'm playing along with the track, so I'm playing like piano to the track, so it's it's pretty important for me to have like a steady sound source.

So if it's going all over the place, it becomes really hard to play along with.

Unruly people, yes, jumping around.

So that was pretty interesting, but I think we we we got it uh we got it fixed in the in the sound check, right?

Okay. I want to turn to you, uh Morten, who did the mix yesterday. Is this idea that you can engage the the the audience much more? Is that something that you think about when you when you do the mixing?

Yeah, we have to think about how we engage people, and we also have to think about where people are standing and how we want them to perceive the whole experience, because it is very different from wherever you stand in the whole building, and we have to think about everything and make it like shoot everyone in a way, but also make it a bit different everywhere, yeah.

Maybe Adam, you you can add to that because you were not at mixing the one pistol, but the other concert. So so is it something that you think about this engagement with the audience?

Yeah, well, there was the the the big difference between Umpistol and what we did, where I think it was Robert who mentioned that the Umpistol concert would was he called it the well, where everybody's standing almost like above him and looking down at him, uh, which is like completely opposite of what we're used to, having the artist on top and looking down.

What we did instead was we had the artist on the second floor and the audience on the bottom two floors. Um the artist was still like on the outside looking down at them, which um made quite a difference for them. Um and in that way we still had that like um yeah, like that dimensionality of having the artists uh above the audience in that way, and and that just creates that different interaction.

So the artist didn't have to do that same where am I going to look? They am just going to look down, and then they're gonna hit most of it. And when they talk to them, they didn't really talk much for for our concert, but but they they had that control if they wanted it.

I forgot to ask you, Jens, about uh this paradox about um getting the the sound uh that you want and then what the system can deliver. Can you elaborate a little bit on that? Because you you you were saying something about that it was challenging and as an artist, yeah.

I think it's also because I'm mixing uh electronic um music, like some backtracks and some electronic sound sources with the acoustic sound of the piano, and because we decided to not have like wedges, monitor wedges on the floor to help me. I was playing on the same speaker system, I was listening to what the audience was listening to, basically, and that's something I very rarely do.

So it's like when you're a live musician, you're always used to having that help from monitor wedges, so it doesn't really give you the one-to-one um audience perspective sound-wise, but it like it lifts the the sound sources you need to be able to hear as a performer. And I'm a little bit um I regret a little bit that we didn't do that because we were discussing it, should we do it or shouldn't we?

And we decided not to because so I was actually um I was have having troubles hearing the piano when when we were going full blast with the sound, and uh we also had like a louder sound level than we um had at the sound check. So I I was like quite blown away by the power of the sound, especially where I was standing right in the middle of the well, and uh it kind of it I I guess it's it is supposed to be the sweet spot, but it's also like where all sound ends up in a way.

So it's um I I think it would be for another concert, it would be ideal to have some monitor, which is yeah, yeah.

Also, just with that, we also have because we we've set it up in in the way that we have with the artist in the middle. The issue with especially the piano was that every speaker is facing towards the piano mics, so it was difficult to get uh like the right level of piano to the musician because we had all the speakers feeding back to him already.

So, in order not to get feedback issues, we had to like yeah, control it.

And and these are technical constraints. Um could you imagine that it could also actually inspire creative decisions, or is it mainly just a frustration?

No, I don't want to come out uh come across too negative here, but it's just you're you're asking me for my honest opinion, and and I I I was um I was also really enjoying playing there, and um I'm just thinking um yeah, there are some challenges when it comes to acoustic signals, like imagine having a whole orchestra like with 100 microphones, it it's gonna be quite challenging feedback-wise.

So uh, and then I was also asking to have the level taken down a little bit towards the end, and and we did that, and I think it helped a lot. And um, in the immersive concert experience, there's always that possibility of going closer to a speaker if you want it louder. That's also what I really enjoy about being at outdoor festivals, for instance.

You can you can more adjust to the level instead of being in a traditional concert venue where you're like kind of forced to hearing the same volume no matter where in the room you are, and that's something really positive, I think, to to to take to take with us from this um setup, like the um yeah, the ability for the audience to to control their sound themselves.

Okay, I want to jump to you with that uh end, uh Martin, because uh you have a traditional room for concerts with a stage and uh a crowd in front of the stage. But what do you do now when you are working on developing new concert formats to try to engage the the audience more or to to make different things?

Well, the first step for me is applying for money because this is expensive. But uh if I can just wrap up the effect on the artistic uh thingy. Um I think that it should actually be possible that these technical possibilities have some kind of uh effect on the artistic uh choices. Like if if you have a band with an intro, it's usually uh 30 seconds long.

And with these technological opportunities, it might be one minute long. And it can also maybe challenge the artist to think, okay, how how can I use this to put the audience in a certain state of mind? Uh so kind of uh uh expand the artistic possibilities. Yeah, that was something totally different, but I uh your question again, sorry.

No, it was it was more like if you have a traditional square room for concerts with the stage in one end and and uh and the crowd, and and there's also another thing. Anthropologically, we are also socialized into the understanding that when you go to a concert, you are in front of the stage and you have a kind of engagement with the artist.

Uh so it's a very strong socialization that you stay where you are. I mean in festivals, you're right, Jens. There you can walk around and you can move if you don't like uh where the sound from where you stand.

Well, as an audience, I I need I need some kind of guidelines. Can I move around? Uh, where should I look? How do I experience this? And that was what I actually experienced yesterday. I I brought my daughter, she's 12 years old, she's like a canary to put in the mine and see how she reacts. And she just told me, Oh, this is creepy.

And when it was all over, she said, Was that it? Um but actually I was a little bit in doubt on on whether I could move around. So the the lighting helped me a little bit. So, where to look and where should my attention go? And it's the same thing about my venue that people know what they are supposed to do when they walk in the door, check the tickets, they go have a beer and they go to the either standing or they go to their seat.

Everything is clear. Uh, if if you walk into a room like this, it's a little bit um unsafe safe in a way. Am I behaving correctly? Am I getting the most out of it?

Yeah.

So I I guess the next step is to think about how how we can guide the audience in some way.

Yeah, Jens, and then I want uh to ask you, Oscar, about if you were in doubt where to go, but uh we should get back to that.

No, I just want to add to that because I think Martin has a really uh uh good point. And um also when we're doing these immersive concerts, it's like um I think it's it's challenging this whole traditional uh way of watching shows where the where the spectator is passive, and uh quite often you see people standing.

The only active thing they do is pick up their iPhone and start filming the show. And I think when you have a setup like this, it becomes a little bit more people become a little bit more aware of uh themselves and them being a spectator. Like, where do I stand? Can I go over here? Am I disturbing if I walk during this show?

I was also a bit like uh during the the the choir concert, I was like, is it am I making too much noise if I walk down the stairs? And like I was questioning myself these, and I think that's a that's a quite um nice thing actually to to gain from that because you you also um become super aware of of what's going on in the room where the other like more passively spectating is is a bit more I don't know limbing like behavior, and uh I I really wouldn't like to see like culture consumption going in that direction only uh because like I th I see culture more as an exchange and uh and something that we can you know gain from.

Yeah, yeah, that's interesting. Oscar, uh how was it with you? Were you ever in doubt where to go or what to do?

I was in doubt. During the thousand voices, actually, I stood still for the first half, and then I went up one floor, and then I wanted to move up one floor again, and then I saw like a wall of people, and I was like, okay, maybe I'll stay down here but still walk around. I was not unsure if I was allowed to, but I was moving around quietly.

I was trying to not make too much noise, but still get the full because I feel like being able to walk around like that is so I my curiosity was like, what is it like over here, and what does it sound like from this place? And what if I go further away or closer to the middle? And so yes, I was unsure, but very quickly I became just curious, and it was more like playing around with and number of music, where it's like I had I got the opportunity to uh tailor it and and play with it, and that was more fun than unsettling, I think, for me as well.

And we were also a couple friends walking around. Oh, what is it like all the way at the top, and what is it like all the way at the bottom? And how about the stairs on the stairs between and so it was more like a play, a game, and it was very fun and very like the music became closer because I was also a part of making the music kinda for my own experience at least.

Yeah. Um could it be a possibility that the artist should kind of announce, you know, you're welcome to walk around, or or like like to avoid this uh socialization of and now I'm standing here with my beard and I don't do anything.

I think that it shouldn't be said. Okay, because that pushes people to move if they want to move, and if they don't want to move, that's fine as well. Because if you as an artist, I think if I got told uh you're very much allowed to move, then I would think, okay, when okay, I should move probably at some point.

And if I if I found the good spot and I want to stay there, that's fine as well. So not having the direction I found was yes more unsettling, a little bit nervous, like is it okay, but uh more pleasant in the end because it was my choice as a listener to to move and not a here you have to do this and you have to stand here and you have to move around and like it's not too square, more like a circle instead, and I find that nicer personally at least.

Okay.

Adam, you had a lot Yeah um yeah, I just wanted to add that that's for us as engineers on uh projects like this, that's one of the fun challenges as well that we know that some people will be curious and walk around and some people will be stationary. And we need to mix with that in mind. But and in some ways it's not that different from regular stereo concerts.

You will have people who will move around a bit and and you will have a lot of people who are stationary. Um so in that way it's not that different. What We thought a lot about was the the idea of when you have a stereo concert, the sound will emanate from the stage. And in this kind of concert, it's the where is the focus actually?

Because you will have an artist down there, but sound won't emanate from there. And what we did for a thousand voices was that I know the singers will be on the second floor. So I will mix with that as the zero point, like the emanating place, and then I will build it out from there. So for example, with a thousand voices, what happened on the fourth floor would be very, very much similar to what happened in the ground floor.

So if people are moving around, then of course they will get a different experience from the first to the second. But even though you're on the second floor and you're staying there the entire concert, you will still get quite similar an experience as to the first floor.

So I want us to talk a little bit about these aesthetic uh experiences as uh as audience. But maybe we can start with you, Jens, and uh is it something that you think about when you do the performance or your kind of music or your art?

To move people, definitely. Yes. I mean I I really like playing with sub frequencies. There was a quite a lot of bass on some tracks, but also having that contrast between having a really powerful bass almost like jungle or dubstable track next to a new classical piano piece is something I really like to uh work with in a in a concert format to bring people on that you know hilly journey instead of just going uh flatline like a lot of electronic shows today do.

Sometimes uh something that provokes people a little bit because if they are used to the klopping environment, you have like normally very Shangra strict principles or rules that you have like a drum and bass party, you would only hear 180 to 200 BPM all night, and it's basically compressed in the same way, and uh there's like very little um dynamic um change except for the build-ups and the drops, and uh yeah, uh, and um so that's always something that I've liked to um to break out of, and um and that's uh that has made me jump around a lot of genres for the last two decades, yeah.

So um yeah.

So the interaction, um the interaction, uh like like the audience, how they engage with what you perform, does it increase in concerts like the one you had yesterday? Or you couldn't see them, so you didn't notice.

I wish I could clone, could have cloned myself and be able to walk around also to hear the differences in sound. And to be honest, I think that that would have been the perfect scenario to like have more than one day to to to check out the sound system and to like walk around and have like a a sound check that that was like maybe an entire day of you know fine-tuning and you know, but um I think in a in a in a big room like this, there's that like um it can be a little bit challenging, like we were also talking about for people that it's like it's a bit like stepping into a cathedral where you're like overwhelmed uh with awe in a way by the architecture, and it and you and you feel a little small

and insignificant in this building, so it maybe you you don't like just break your your funkiest dance moves, uh whereas in a in a in a small club where people are standing tight together, people would be probably more indifferent in in how they behave because like everybody's mashed together in a small room, so who cares?

And here it's like uh everyone can see me, uh, and and I think that makes people a little bit more self-aware, and uh so to make them lose the control and and you know engage more freely in the music is uh is something I think it takes a bit more effort. Uh so I would have loved to see like a whole evening or maybe a whole day, maybe a whole weekend of music in this room because then you would also have like you would create an atmosphere where it becomes normal, and people will have a few drinks, go to the bar, come back and and be more relaxed in the room, whereas yesterday was more formal.

Okay. And uh from the engineering uh part of it, is it something that you again again have in your mind when you do the the the mixing and putting the layers under it? Uh how much research do you do in advance? How much do you talk with the artists? How much uh preparation is it?

Well, I'm on the spectrum of a lot of preparation for the concert we did. Uh Morgan can talk about having like just a half day to do something. But um for our project, we I got sent about 80 tracks that they would sing to, and then we recorded some more in calling uh uh back in September, and that ended up being 80 more uh tracks, and then I did some sound design for it for this specific room, which added uh 160 extra tracks.

Uh so we had just above 300 uh we had like 320-340 tracks of backing tracks. That's without the live stuff we did as well. Um, so there was a lot of preparation. We spent a month just in this room mixing it for the concert. We had the artists come here and listen to it in this room, coming with feedback.

So we we had a few rounds of dialing it in to be exactly what we wanted, as well with the lights talking about the whole visual representation of what did we want. And we did a whole day of discussing where do we think people will be and how should we maneuver uh compared to that, in order to create the sense that we wanted with this concert.

So we had a lot of preparation, I thought a lot about a lot about how do we move people, uh both emotionally and like bodily, as as as you mentioned. Um, and then we had a just a lot of uh we talked a lot about like the whole dynamics of it, because all of a sudden we don't of course we've always had the like the stereo uh widening thing and how mono do we want it to be and how stereo do we want it to be, and creating dynamics that way.

Um we have also always had the creating dynamics like frequency-wise and volume-wise, but having like these three dimensions just adds a whole nother level to that, and we can do the whole frequency thing on each level and compare it to where people are. So that was a huge part of our preparation for that concert.

So then we are maybe back to your uh thing about the funding, uh Martin, because it seems like it gives like an extra layer to the concerts. But if the artist is coming like days ahead, it will be of course a larger fee or more expensive.

I'm sure that and yeah, uh obviously it's gonna be more expensive. But but then again, it might be worth it because we need to develop ourselves. We're coming from an acoustic world of music where we explore and experience the music, uh engaged with it, not only physically, but also our ears. Uh I really like this acoustic feel where you should uh stretch your ears to focus on the double bass because it's always too low.

But it's a it it's real in a way. And then we move towards uh some stereo where everything should be equal and no matter where you are in the room, you should be able to hear the bass. And then maybe now we are setting ourselves free again. So you can uh as an audience choose where you want to go and how you want to experience this music.

It's not just the sound engineer who has all the power, but as a listener, you also have the power. And I I think uh it might be expensive to set people free, but it's worth it.

I would like to open up for questions uh from the audience also, and uh and maybe if there are any questions.

Jens, you mentioned uh giving up control to Morden, the engineer. And so far, unmentioned part of it was uh a part I took on, which I've seen happen at other immersive cons as well, which was that Morden was behind the mixer doing way most of the show, but during the show he handed me the iPad and said, You go out and listen to the room, come back, tell me how it sounds, do whatever you need to do.

So we were actually, in a way, two engineers. So not only is there a uh sort of a loss of use, a loss of control, but also a gain of I guess audience-esque perspective. How do both of you perceive this sort of new overlap mixing of roles? How did that feel to you artistically, both as the actual artists, but also artistically as the mixer?

And I guess does that excite you? How did that feel?

Morton, will you start?

From like an engineer's perspective, there's something wrong about handing over control to another person because I'm the engineer, but it needs to be done in a space like this because I can't listen everywhere, and I need ears in other places. Um so I was thankful that I could hand it over to a person that I trust, so I knew it would be uh a good outcome.

Um yeah.

Yeah, in a way you became our clone. Like I I talked earlier about that I wish I had a clone to walk around, but I also had to sit in the middle and play. And um I'm just yeah, I I think that's a a great great way of doing that teamwork. Uh that's that you are more people controlling the sound. And uh maybe there's something to expand upon.

Like maybe that that could be also like uh audience participation, like uh maybe installing some some iPads with some panning possibilities for people to uh you know participate in the actual mix of the show. Maybe an idea for Gosel Martin, I don't know. Uh yeah, but there's also the risk of uh you know it ending up in a big chaotic.

But I I guess those parameters can be, you know, set in a way where it doesn't get too out of control.

Hi, uh I'm Robin. Uh and I was uh and forgive me if you already went over this. I was thinking about um the balance between like a scripted concert where you already thought about how your body language and uh how you're gonna communicate with the audience and how you try to balance that with also giving them space to uh decide for themselves how they want to experience and perceive your concert.

Have you made any thoughts about what you can do as a performer to give the audience space but also try to guide them and keep them in a space where they also receive what you're trying to convey to them? Um yeah.

Sure. I mean normally I would be um introducing the tracks a lot more than I did yesterday. I just felt yesterday that it was um kind of disturbing people's experience if if I was to interrupt them between every song, so I decided to keep the talk to a minimum. Uh but um there's something to to explore there, definitely, and uh and I I probably would approach it differently the next time because it's also I think it's also nice sometimes to give people a little guidance.

Like I did a couple of years ago, I did an uh album for um inner journeys and psychedelic therapy. So when we when we toured with that album, we were like asking people to sit down, close their eyes, and uh you know, actually not watch us on stage. It was uh quite uh um interesting uh to see how how people would engage with that.

But but they did that, they they actually closed their eyes for for an entire hour and just sat and they had the wildest uh experiences they they came and shared with me after the show. So so there's um there's definitely a lot of ways to come come about it, and um but for these immersive, I don't know, when when people have to move around, I think yeah, I think it's probably a little disturbing to to get it back into that traditional concert way of doing a concert with you know introduction, thank you, and all that.

And um but uh probably I would uh prefer to have it just go like in a straight uninterrupted stream of music. Um with my technical gear I had yesterday that wasn't really possible. And then when you have like a silence between songs, people would will automatically start clapping, and then you are kind of breaking the spell.

But that's how it is. But um, yeah, so does that answer your question? Yeah, okay.

Okay. So now we have heard a little bit about the immersive concerts from the artistic part, from the audience, and from the technical part. And uh I don't know if we got any way closer to uh to the question on why we should make new concert performance. I think we did. Uh of course, the future of immersive concerts, there are some constraints as it appears.

Uh, but uh it seems like both artists and audience had uh some great experiences yesterday, so that's definitely something that we will work uh with in the future as well. Uh, also together with you uh from Kosel, because you have this special task now to actually do something. You actually got some money.

Yeah, we had some uh funding from the Danish Arts Council, and uh together with uh Vega, we are trying to look into some possibilities of new concert formats. And and it's not all connected to immersive sound, it can also be like the last mile on your way to the to the venue. How do we prepare our audience for the best possible uh experience?

So it can be in in many ways, and and the cool thing about this uh box of money is that we we can actually uh try stuff out and it and it we we don't as as as many other cultural projects it's always a great success, but it really isn't. But but uh but this time it's allowed for us to fail and to make stuff uh different.

And then hopefully with you guys uh and your expertise and um we can also ask the audience, okay, how how do you actually experience this instead of it's just me and and and my um feel of okay, I think we should go in this direction, then then do it uh better in a way. So I think uh this um the funding we have uh is four years from now.

Uh it also has a time span which allows us to try out a lot of different stuff. And then in the end we can see how far we got.

Yeah. And and I guess some of us were together with Horstkiller Festival for the Grasp Festival, and we had a very a pretty simple 7-1 immersive setup, which can also be done in venues like yours. So it doesn't have to be an atrium because there's nowhere else in in Denmark or in Europe, I think, where it is like this.

So yeah. But uh thank you so much for attending. Thank you for coming for the panelists here, and uh, I hope you will enjoy the rest of Sonic Days. Thank you, thank you. Thank you.

Debate: Artistic Intent versus Audience Perception

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