Berliner Lied ’24 (Song of Berlin ’24)

Immersive Soundscape Composition, Museum Neukölln, 48 Stunden Neukölln “Urbane Stille”

The year 1924 marks the birth of the electric Berlin S-Bahn – and of a distinctive sound that shaped the acoustic identity of the city for seven decades. The trains of the 1930s produced a glissando-like sound that rang through the urban canyons like a human voice. With their final retirement at the turn of the millennium, this “singing” fell silent forever – the modern S-Bahn trains sound different: colder, more sterile.

“Berliner Lied ’24” makes this lost sound the leitmotif of a soundscape composition that weaves historic recordings together with the human voice. The work follows the Cagean idea that all sounds are potentially music: the unintended acoustic by-product of a technical process becomes compositional material, and the machine its singing protagonist. Presented in 5.1 surround sound with a vibrating seat, the installation invites a multisensory encounter with a vanished sonic world – a homage to 100 years of the Berlin S-Bahn.