Tuning Rituals: Bohlen-Pierce-Skala — blurred edges – Festival für aktuelle Musik Hamburg

In the organizer's words:

Program

The Bohlen-Pierce scale was constructed independently of each other by the Hamburg engineer Heinz Bohlen (1972), the Dutch software developer Kees van Prooijen (1978) and the American engineer John Pierce (1984). Remarkably, all three came up with the same 13-step, non-octave scale, which focuses on odd-numbered frequency ratios. Since then, the BP scale has attracted the interest of musicians, composers, music theorists and instrument makers.

Against this background, Yuri Akbalkan, Todd Harrop and Elena Khurgina asked themselves whether the harpsichord could be retuned to the new scale of the BP system. By using the BP scale on a historical harpsichord for the first time and developing additional, specially tuned instruments (BP metallophones), the project expands tonal and compositional possibilities. It combines historical instrument practice with current music technology and thus creates points of contact for artistic research, new concert formats and the development of a specialized repertoire.

Concert program

Yuri Akbalkan
Prooemium praeter rem (premiere 2026)
for harpsichord, sensors and electronics

Todd Harrop
Preludes (premiere 2026)
for harpsichord, percussion and electronics

Xiao Fu
truth::shift (premiere 2026)
for harpsichord and electronics

Genoël von Lilienstern
On the spectrum (UA 2026)
for Linn instrument

Tam Thi Pham
Between Bar and Bell (UA 2026)
for percussion and electronics

Improvisation
harpsichord, percussion, electronics

* World premiere (short UA)

A project by Sensorium Nord as part of blurred edges - Festival for contemporary music Hamburg (29.05. - 28.06.2026)

Price information:

Box Office and advance booking in the TONALi ticket store Advance booking € 13 / reduced € 10 Box Office € 16 Soliticket € 30 Free choice of seats