Four days at Q-O2, Brussels (19–22/10/2026) with the advanced master students of the HOGENT conservatory, linked to ICTUS. Together we built a collective instrument: ourselves, each other, and a self-soldered wifi phone. The core question: how does a group become one resonating body, visually, vibrationally and sonically?
The learning was horizontal: I showed my work, they shared their stories, and nobody was only teacher or only student. Every day opened with a circle of breath and humming, had a logbook moment, and closed with one discovery, one question and one wish for tomorrow. Mistakes were material: a broken solder joint or an out-of-tune note is a starting point. Anyone could step out or observe at any time.
Four days
- Monday · Listening: who are we together? An introduction round with Julia from Q-O2, choir forming on breath and drones, and a story round: when did you ever feel one with a group? I showed the Human Organ Concerto, MOODY®, Breathing Sirenas, the Multiplayer Buttplug, Fluister and Flowerpower, followed by a first Fluister voice chain. Homework: a one-minute graphic score.
- Tuesday · Building: the instrument. Flowerpower with one earbud in and one ear free, solo scores swapped in pairs, an introduction to the ESP32, and soldering in pairs: one solders, the other holds and checks. Flashing the firmware, connecting to Fluister, and the first sound through your own device.
- Wednesday · Composing: scores and instructions. Choir forming with the devices, scores in trios, housings from cardboard, textile and found objects, and writing and recording new instructions for Flowerpower and Fluister, including left–right pairs that contradict each other.
- Thursday · Playing: collective resonance. The trio scores became one tutti piece, rehearsed for space and transitions, and played as a participatory performance at 18h.
Scores beyond the staff
The score grew in three layers. Solo: what is my sign? A one-minute score with three signs and a legend that someone else can read without explanation. Trio: how do our signs talk to each other? A three-to-five-minute score with at least one tool or toy, one moment for the wifi phones and one moment of silence. Tutti: what is our piece? The trio scores became chapters of one collective piece, and a score could appear live on every screen through Fluister.
Questions to provoke the group: what if the score is a map instead of a timeline? What if time is set by breath or heartbeat instead of a clock? How do you notate energy, tension or closeness? References: Pauline Oliveros (Sonic Meditations, Deep Listening), Cornelius Cardew (Treatise, Scratch Orchestra) and Fluxus instruction pieces.
The wifi phone
Every student built a wifi phone that joins Fluister as a voice in the circle: an ESP32-WROOM-32 with an INMP441 microphone and a PCM5102A headphone output. We drew the path of a voice on the board, from mouth to microphone to ESP32 to wifi to server to someone else’s ear, then soldered, tested, flashed and played. The question behind it: what does it mean to make your own instrument and share it in a network?
The performance, 22/10/2026
Twelve players, six scores and student pieces, about 39 minutes. The thread is colour: the ending colour of Music statues is carried into Colours & animals and Colour meditation.
| Time | Piece | What happens | Who |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0:00 | Tuning in | Circle, shared breath, long tones (score 1) | everyone |
| 0:03 | Music statues | Play, freeze, play. The group decides the ending colour | Aleksandra & Si Yi |
| 0:08 | Metronome drift | An Internet Metronome on screen: sync, drift, return (score 2) | everyone |
| 0:12 | Exciting Research | MOODY® explained, straight into MOODY Thermostat (score 3) | Joke + wearers |
| 0:17 | Canon cards | Cards with movements and sounds, played as a canon | Nolan & Zoe |
| 0:22 | Handoff | Catch the last sound and transform it (score 5) | next group |
| 0:23 | Colours & animals | A game with colours and animals, starting from the ending colour of Music statues | Luis & Liese-Lotte |
| 0:28 | Colour meditation | A game-meditation on colour | Zoe |
| 0:32 | Collective dream | Collective dream, collective energy, building up to maximum | Aleksandra |
| 0:36 | Excitement decay | Halve your activity every 10 breaths, into silence (score 6) | everyone |
The scores, the device manual and the instruction scripts are available on request: jcaimo@samenschool.org.
With Bert Lasseel, Aleksandra Jopek, Roberto Fontanella, Luis Ramos, Xiao Cheng Wang, Ali ChoupaniNejad, Joan German, Nolan Ehlers, Sarah Grace Graves, Zoe Markle, Chi Pok Lee, Si Yi Xia and Liese-Lotte Bekaert. Thanks to Julia and Dries (Q-O2), Joris (HOGENT) and Tom De Cock (ICTUS).