carleklev

the bat choir

sound art

kulturbryggan

The Bat Choir is an ongoing project that was launched in the summer of 2026 and is funded by Kultrubryggan. It is an artistic and interdisciplinary project that aims to explore and interpret the sound world of bats – a sound world that is not normally accessible to humans. By converting their ultrasound ‘live’ into audible musical material, the project aims to create a unique and immediate experience in which we humans can hear these unheard voices.

This page will be updated as work progresses...
For further information, please contact Jan Carleklev.

The Bat Choir is a concert and excursion that takes the audience to places where bats can be found. This might be by a forest pond, in a harbour area or right in the heart of a city. But always where there are active bats. In other words, a twilight concert. The bats’ sounds are mediated via an instrument developed by the project. It functions as a signal converter for sonification, a process that makes it possible to transform the bats’ soundscape into musical material.

The audience will also experience the bats through surrogates consisting of a professional human choir with a background in medieval choral music.

A non-human auditory phenomenon is transformed into a choral musical expression, where biological perception and musical structure converge in a shared sonic space.

The project aims to foster a connection between humans and bats and to encourage reflection on how we humans interact with other species. The project serves as a starting point for rethinking humanity’s view of itself as the crown of creation – a view that is constantly based on human sovereignty and the human perspective in our relationship with nature.

We are not the crown of creation, as we have come to believe, but all too often we grope in the dark. Perhaps the bat can help us as we stumble about in the shadows of our limitations. Help us to fail and try again. We know we will never hear the bat’s song as it sounds to them. But time and again, we can imagine how it echoes through the night.

The bats’ sounds are mediated via an instrument being developed by the project. It functions as a signal converter for sonification, a process that converts ultrasound into music. The instrument enables various methods of converting the bats’ soundscape into musical material. For example, frequency modulation, time expansion and echo generation. The project team sees potential in creating both tonal and rhythmic material. There are many possibilities for mapping the signals to different sonic and musical parameters.

Project team:
Jan Carleklev, artistic director and sound artist
Karin Lagergren composer and ensemble leader
Hans Fransson, nature guide Tabergsgruvan
Sebastian Hastrup, instrument maker and creative technologist
Kristin Jonzon, singer
Dorothea Knust, singer

Sammarbetsparter
Michael Schneider, biologist and bat expert
Katrin & Mats Caldeborg Konsthall Norra Kvarken

and, of course,
the bats, soloists and co-creators

För mer information kontakta Jan Carleklev