Soundlapse Soundlapse is an artwork that intuitively alters the traditional
perception of the everyday structures we live in. It's a mosaic of short sound samples,
aural data, recorded every day, at the very same place, at the very same time of the day,
for one year.
In the piece you experience the gradually changing seasons as the natural elements slowly react to them.
The human-caused sounds are the rhythmic parts of the piece: The 7-day week can be clearly divided into a 5-day
work week with all of its buzz and the 2-day weekend as a relief, a moment for breath before the starting week.
The traffic of the cities creates a regular, ever-changing white noise generator. From this perspective,
the piece has also an interesting character with it's noisy, human-made regular irregularities.
The noise of the city is presented side by side with the recordings made in natural environments.
The natural environments change more gradually as the only affecting sounds are the sounds of nature and
their change along the course of the year. The contrast of these two raises questions about sound pollution,
urbanization and the pace in which the modern society is moving.
The installation is currently in production and hopefully taking the box offices by storm sometime around 2024.
A demo of the work can be listened to here:
The Solenoid System I've developed stands at the heart of many of my sonic explorations. This custom motor controller,
synchronized with MAX/MSP and integrated with Ableton Live, has played a pivotal role in shaping my sound design and individual sound art projects.
Version 3 of the System, coompleted in 2023, commands 178 Solenoid motor channels, enabling a diverse range of movements from subtle nuances to
impactful tapping, driven by PWM pulses.
Beyond sound, the Solenoid System transforms physical space into an auditory canvas. During recent trials, this latest
version, built in collaboration with Lucas Weidinger (Solisynth), and firmware by Andrea Vogrig, spans
the venue in a grid layout, allowing for variedsound movement shapes. Whether creating circular patterns, square formations, or
swaying sequences, rapid motor actions across the space immerse audiences in an interactive sonic journey.
The most notable works featuring the Solenoid System are Mechanit Project's
"Koneistos",
Tanssiteatteri Hurjaruuth's "Talvisirkus Super",
and my solo work, the interactive installation "Listener".
These creations spotlight the immersive soundscapes crafted by the Solenoid System, researching the synergy between technology and art.
They invite audiences to explore captivating sonic environments brought to life by the latest evolution of the Solenoid System.
About solenoid motors: A solenoid motor is an electromechanical device that converts electrical energy into mechanical energy using an electromagnet
formed from a coil of wire. This device creates a magnetic field from the electric current, which then generates linear motion.
The solenoid motor comprises a copper coil within a casing and a plunger that moves inside the coil. One end of the plunger has a
cap nut, while the other end is connected to a spring. When current flows through the coil, the magnetic field pushes the plunger
out of the coil. When the current stops, the spring returns the plunger to its original position.
This movement produces a snapping sound. The intensity of the electric pulse regulates the loudness of the snap sound, ranging from a barely audible click to a loud bang.
When multiple motors are arranged in a row, and electric pulses are sent to them in series from one end of the row to the other,
it creates the impression of the physical movement of snaps in space. In Mechanit Project's performance "Mekanis-eloi (dance)," 180 motors are positioned in the
performance space in a grid-like structure, enabling the movement of sound in three-dimensional space across the room. This phenomenon, the movement of sound in space,
is impossible to achieve with a traditional speaker system. In that case, the movement of sound occurs in the "stereo" image formed between the speakers. The solenoid motor
system allows for a genuine three-dimensional auditory experience.
I'm working as a sound designer in The Finnish Association of the Deaf's diverse media publications
have been both a mind-wrecking conceptual challenge and an interest ing artistic test.
The work consists mainly of creating sounds for the association's PR and fundraising content but has
lately included the creation of creative content: Realizing a sound design, an aural translation to sign
language fairy tales.
The most demanding work required the finding of aural ways to communicate the subjective impression
of deaf person: To find a proper factual, but especially an emotional depth to the story. The video
(2 min) can be viewed here: https://youtu.be/WNxJWzadKRk.
photo - Salla Savolainen
I'm working as the convener in the Mechanit Project group. The group is working with the aesthetics of mechanically produced sound and light movement.
The group includes lighting artist Teo Lanerva, sound artists Atte Olsonen and Jani Hietanen, playwright-choreographer Soili Huhtakallio,
the set builder Ville Metsätalo, experience designer Ukko-Pekka Itäpelto, and producer Anita Parri.
photo - Teo Lanerva
2024
HUM - Tuija Lappalainen and her team's work, HUM, is a stage and choreographic sketch that delves
into the poeticsof unknown and inexplicable experiences. The title of the piece refers to a phenomenon or a collection
of phenomenainvolving narratives of low-frequency hums, sounds, or noises that are not audible to everyone and whose
ourceis unlocatable. In the work, abstract displacement and experiences of being moved collide with the materialities
of everyday existence, creating alienating and immersive ruptures, visions, and vibrancies. The stage events make
visible the flows of humanity and corporeality, in relation to questions of existence, time, and mortality, within
the grandiose framework of everyday horror.
The sound design of the performance is dogmatically based on white noise and sine waves manipulated in a number
of different ways. The tonally rich-sounding material constructs suggestive soundscapes that nod towards urban
sound surroundings, desert winds, and some unrecognized mechanical machine pulsating somewhere nearby. This creates
hardy, growing, sometimes almost oppressive atmospheres of monotonous emotional states while maintaining a clear
progression towards something looming seemingly just around the corner.
Coreographer: Tuija Lappalainen
Light design: Aku Lahti
Sound desing: Atte Olsonen
Costume design: Pauliina Sjöberg
Dancer: Maria Mäkelä
Production: Tuija Lappalainen, Barker Teatteri Turku
photo - Tuija Lappalainen
2023
Mechanit Project's latest performance Koneistos is a synthetic nature experience,
a performance installation in which the light modules and mechanical sound machines are the main performers. The work seeks beauty
and warmth from the versatile sounds and clumsy movements of physical metallic materials and machines.
I work as the facilitator and leader of Mechanit Project. The group includes lighting artist Teo Lanerva, sound artists
Atte Olsonen and Jani Hietanen, playwright-choreographer Soili Huhtakallio, the set builder Ville Metsätalo, experience
designer Ukko-Pekka Itäpelto, and producer Anita Parri.
- - - - - - -
“Mechanit Project's Koneistos is one of the high points of the Lux Helsinki [2023] Festival” (HBL)
"The lights move vertically and horizontally in the abstract, raw, beautiful space of the metal piping.
The light-beings feel like something alive. They climb, descend, crawl, stop, hide, and change color. They do
their own work, act, and perform. ... In Koneistos we rely on our own sensations and associations. It is this
openness that is so luxurious. For me, the various abstract geometric shapes built from the steel pipes of this
synthetic forest were associated with the three-dimensionality of the spatial spaces of Kandinsky's paintings.
I was inside them." - Hanna Helavuori, hannahelavuori.com
“During an hour’s meditative journey, the audience experiences a powerful, fully mechanically realized nature experience” (HBL review 7/25/2020)
- - - - - - -
In Koneistos, the audience is invited to a “synthetic forest” spread over an area of 100m2. The forest,
built of five-meter aluminum and carbon fiber pipes, is the habitat of dozens of small, mechanical creatures that
communicate through movement, sound, and light. Mechanical light-creatures climb along the tree trunks in dialogue with
sound objects sounding around the forest. As performers, we are present in the space, but more as equal residents of
the forest with the machines and the audience, rather than in a hierarchical position as performers.
Koneistos was premiered at the Lux Helsinki 2023 festival and was elected to the Finnish Light Art Association's
Lux Helsinki 2024 international curator residency pitch-program. Jani Hietanen's and Atte Olsonen's sound design in Koneistos
was nominated for both the "Äänisäde 2022" and "Äänisäde 2023" awards.
Koneen Säätiö, the Finnish Cultural Foundation, The Swedish Cultural Foundation in Finland and Arts
Promotion Centre Finland is funded the project.
Team Sound design and production - Atte Olsonen
Sound design - Jani Hietanen
Visual design - Teo Lanerva
Artistic dialogue - Soili Huhtakallio
Production - Anita Parri
Set design and building - Ville Metsätalo
In just around the corner by choreographer Iina Taijonlahti and sound designer Atte Olsonen, the foresight of the future is
examined through the movement of the human and the robot ball. Taijonlahti performs the piece with a robot ball.
A black swan also visits the piece. The black swan theory is a metaphor used in future research, which comes as a
surprise due to its rarity and is often rationalized afterwards. The working group has consulted future reacher Marko Ahvenainen during the work process.
I was responsible for the sound design of the work. The soundscape of the piece consists of footsteps and the
sounds of robots and solenoid motors drawing shapes in the acoustical performance space.
Bruce Nauman's video work Walking in an Exaggerated Manner Around the Perimeter of a Square, based on
walking, served as a reference for the piece.
The Addams Family production at the Helsinki Art University was my first leap into the world of musicals. The musical, directed by
Jermo Grundström was my fist touch into the world of musicals. I found working on a musical's sound design extremely fun and challenging, it requires a lot of attention
to the smallest of details as well as a wide understanding of the artforms of music, theatre and dance. I found myself
falling for this wholesome way of making art.
photo - Roosa Oksaharju
2021
TSÖRK!43 is an installation built in collaboration with Jani Hietanen. The work combines the mechanically
produced creature-like-sounds of solenoid motors with a cicada-soundscape produced through a diffused 12 channel soundsystem.
The sounds bridges the gap between mechanic and synthetic sounds creating a vivid surrounding sound experience.
The installation was premiered at the ARS108 festival in Nokia, Finland in August 2021.
Listener is a spatial interactive audiovisual sound installation. The audience is invited one by one into a
darkened room to explore the vivid interactivity of the surrounding rattling sound in the light of a flashlight.
”The visitor enters the fully blacked out space alone. The only light is the flashlight they are handed at the entrance.
There is a continuous uneasy rattling, a cricket-like sound that soon surrounds the visitor completely.
The rattling goes suddenly quiet when the visitor lights the flashlight.
The visitor searches around the space with the flashlight, the rattling gradually fades in.
It feels like the source of the rattling is though continuously evading the light beam however hard you try to find it.
The visitor can slowly see the “root system” of cables that has grown like a vine over the carpet, the tables, the walls.
Some are even hanging from the ceiling. In the end of every vine is a little metallic thing, a motor of some kind.”
Aesthetically the work investigates the agency of machines. The timid character of the motors invites the viewer to meditate
on the presence shared between her/him and the mechanical beings in the shared space.
Technically the installation is built around a modular solenoid motor and light sensor system.
The fully acoustic and spatially articulate soundscape of the work is produced solely by the
mechanical action of the solenoids. The work is adaptable to a wide variety of spaces and is
scalable with its 20-54 solenoid motors and can accommodate spaces between 20-70m2.
A slideshow (4:40 min) accompanied by a binaural recording can be found here: https://youtu.be/-7d404tP7Y8, please listen with headphones.
2020
2019
Mechanit Project - Burning Man (2019)
Every year, a temporary city, the Black Rock City of 80 000 people is built, deconstructed and burned in the Nevada desert.
Mechanit Project
made an appearance with a sound installation at the Burning Man event in Black Rock City in August 2019.
The work was realized at the Finnish camp Steam of Life's sauna, designed by the Helsinki-based JKKM architecture agency.
The installation’s fully mechanical soundscape created it's own tranquil atmosphere inviting the visitors of the sauna to engulf
themselves into this alternative mechanical reality and take distance from the noises of the Black Rock City buzz. The sounds moved as
a progression from the sounds of everyday metallic sauna and hygiene accessories to the abstract forms of circular and square objects and
furthermore to become elevated mechanically souding echoes in metal plates mounted from the sauna’s ceiling.
Team Sound design and production: Atte Olsonen & Ukko-Pekka Itäpelto
photo - Hannu Rytky
2018
The Gambler was my first sound design for the big stage, a theatre play based on the Dostojevsky novel, directed by Jari Juutinen.
The production was a collaboration between Sadsongskomplex:fi, the Veliky Novgorod Drama theatre and the Veliky
Novgorod Philharmonic Orchestra, premiered in November 2018.
photo - Антоний Киш
FibObOoObOoOoOdelays three-piece
ensemble consists of former Sonology students Roche van Tiddens, Simone Sacchi and me.
The projects aim is to research the manipulation of different kinds of timbre in the live performance.
I've been fortunate to have programming orientated colleges in the team and have got the introduction of how
to use both SuperCollider and MaxMSP in to run live processes of signal manipulation.
The usage of contact microphones has been another great personal discovery. When using contact mics, the absence of
signal spill creates a powerful opening to discover different resonating objects and their textures in detail.
photo - Lucinda Watts
2017
Helena split is a radiophonic, binaural work, that takes an abstract approach in how it treats the spatiality of aural surroundings.
The piece splits up the stereo picture in two distinct channels, two separate spaces - left and right.
A voice narrative ties the separated spaces together. The binaural, totally realistic, field-recorded
spaces are superimposed with each other and thus create whole new, impossible spaces.
The work (4 min) can be listened to here, please listen with headphones:
photo - Raviv Ganchrow
Sphere is a theatre play about the process of becoming deaf.
- Description coming any minute now. Beware.
Gravel is an installation made as a part of the Audio Masterclass at RITCS, Brussels in 2017.
The work discovers the different textures of the pavement on the 4,5 km Zennewandeling hike track in Deersel.
The diverse structures vary from cobblestone to asphalt, and from sand and gravel to grass-covered natural paths.
The material was collected by dragging a T-shirt (above) covered bag of sand around the track
with a contact microphone in it. I was highly excited to find out, that by the usage of contact microphones,
I can completely cut out the nearby highway. Moreover, the aural content became to be somehow very organic,
feeling almost alive.
The work was presented in a darkened room with two 15-inch speakers next to your head on moderate volume.
The video was displayed on a CRT TV-screen in the middle of the room. The white dot on the video travels around
a path in the form of the route.
Edge of the Clouds - a documentary film by Hanna Kaihlanen.
Zhujinnong is a shibi, the spiritual leader of Qiang ethnic minority.The Qiang people have lived in the mountains of
Northwest China for hundreds of years, and their religion arises from the surrounding nature. Shibi, as the communicator
between the Gods of nature and the community, runs certain important ceremonies to pray for health, fortune and safety.
The film is following Zhujinnong’s struggle between the ancient history of Qiang culture and modern impact of the
constantly widening contemporary China. Somewhere between the mountain peak and the valley down below lies the ancient spirituality.
I composed the saxophone-ambient soundtrack to the film.
Hybris is a theater piece premiered in 2016 at the Helsinki Student theatre.
With four women on stage the performance is both a feministic statement in it self and a study in
self awareness and self value.
The piece is built around a strong atmosphere that moves around in the area between moody and mellow,
hardly taking itself too seriously but at the same time not evading to descend deeper into the complex
layers of a scattered self value.
I worked throughout the piece mainly with drone based atmospheres. An example can be heard below:
photo - Oskari Ruuska
Kevin's secret life in the woods is a binaural soundinstallation originally presented as a
part of a residency at Musica's Soundforest in Neerpelt, Belgium in 2016.
The piece discovers the borderlines between the real and the produced reality.
Please listen to this sample with headphones, in a quiet place, preferably somewhere in the nature.
2015
Mechanit 1.0 (2015) is a live sound and light performance, an adaptation of the sounds of industrial machines recorded by the EU-initiative Work With Sounds (WWS).
Mechanit 1.0 was commissioned by the Tampere Worker’s Museum Werstas and was premiered at the Tampere Steam Engine Museum at the Night of the Museums, May 2015.
The performance was based on the WWS sound library samples. These sound recordings were made to conserve the experiential dimension of a wide diversity of old conserved machinery that only sound can conceal.
Mechanit 1.0 discovers the esthetics of the industrial machine sounds, rearranges them in the shape of a sound and light performance that moves somewhere in the borderlands between abstract sound art, live performance, and techno. It is a contemporary take on the aural qualities of the sounds of industrialism.
Team Sound design and production: Atte Olsonen
Sound design: Ukko-Pekka Itäpelto
Light design: Teo Lanerva
Qui Habitat was a solo dance performance by the dancer-coreographer-visual artist Aino Ojanen.
The performance researched the fluidity of the human body and the experience to exist and live inside this ever
changing, malluable organism. The performance was premiered at Liikelaituri, Tampere, Finland in 2015.
Head of the Sound Department in the 2015 premiered Kristian Smeds play Tabu
on the Finnish National Theatre's main stage.
photo - Ulla Rohunen
2014
Anteropatia is an award winning short film made for the 48h short film competition Uneton48 in May 2014 by the team Pusihätä.
The film ranked 2nd in the competition and won the awards of best cinematography and best editing.
Rakkaus vai taju was one of my first throughoutly composed sound designs. The two-man-band consisting of myself and
Aleksi Ripatti (Ursus Factory) realized a jazz-post punk soundtrack played by drums (Aleksi) and saxophone and electric guitar (myself)
for the performance at the Helsinki Student Theatre.
A demo recording from an early stage of the band rehealsals:
Director: Ariyuki Suzuki
Visual design: Anna Antsalo and Ariyuki Suzuki
Technical design: Tero Laaksonen
Composition: Atte Olsonen, Aleksi Ripatti and working group
Live band: Aleksi Ripatti, Atte Olsonen
Performers: Aini Seppänen, Aino Ojanen, Emilia Tuovila, Essi Kosola, Geoffrey Erista, Joonas Lampi, Into Virtanen,
Marjukka Myllyntaus, Niklas Riikonen, Jani Nikulainen, Salla Rupponen, Topi Orava, Sanna-Mari Metsi, Vesa Heikkinen
Soundlapse
Solenoid system
The Deaf's Association
Mechanit Project
HUM
Mechanit Project 
just around the
Hurjaruuth 
Addams Family
TSÖRK!43
Listener
Mechanit Project 
The Gambler
FibObOoObOdelays
Helena Split
Sphere
Gravel
Edge of the Clouds
Hybris
Kevin's life
Mechanit Project 
Qui Habitat
Finnish National Theatre Tabu
Anteropatia
Rakkaus vai taju
