SOUND X SOUND is a series of compositions by Niels Lyhne Løkkegaard, where each piece is an exploration of one single instrument that is multiplied.

The works of the SOUND X SOUND series was composed in the period between 2014-2015 and in the end 7X7" vinyls was released in a limited  box set edtion in 2016/2017.

The SOUND X SOUND consists of the following pieces:

SOUND X SOUND - MUSIC FOR 8 RECORDERS (2014)
SOUND X SOUND - MUSIC FOR 30 CHROMATIC TUNERS (2015)
SOUND X SOUND - MUSIC FOR 9 PIANOS (2015)
SOUND X SOUND - MUSIC FOR 15 SHAKERS (2015)
SOUND X SOUND - MUSIC FOR 18 CLARINETS (2015)
SOUND X SOUND - MUSIC FOR 16 TRIANGLES (2015)
SOUND X SOUND - MUSIC FOR 10 HI-HATS (2015)

Løkkegaard about the SOUND X SOUND series:

"It’s a pretty simple concept, and it’s not that different from choir music. We’re so familiar with that. When you make a choir piece, the individual voice dissolves into this greater collage of sound. By listening to this timbre that evolved when instruments were multiplied, I found out that the sound suddenly became something else, and it became easier for me, as a listener, to go into this sound. You know that feeling as a listener, where a narrative is pulled down on you and there’s a clear agenda from the composer’s side – that you should feel this from the music? Suddenly, it dawned on me that I liked this multiplication sound because I was free from the individual instrument, the individual player and the individual reference within an instrument. I was free to create my own narrative in this music."

(ATTN:Magazine, Jack Chuter 2016)

Since 2012 Niels Lyhne Løkkegaard has experimented with creating music that lets the instruments transcend their inherent sonic norms and reappear in another form. In the work series SOUND X SOUND (2013-2017) he explores this by way of multiplication which resulted in a series of works multiplying one instrument a number of times: One piece is written for 9 pianos, another for 18 clarinets, 10 hi-hats and so on.

In recent years Løkkegaard explores multiplication of sound even further in pieces such as Triangular Mass for multiple triangles (2016), Birdsongs- for multiple parabolic microphones (2019), SONAR (2017) - for multiple vibraslaps, Harmonia-for multiple harmonicas (2018), A major third consists of 9 different notes - for 30 saxophones (2018) and Quartet pour Sigurd Raschér - for 4 alto saxophones (2019).

Løkkegaard’s aim is to get the instruments to exceed their own familiar sound by multiplying and layering the sound; - attempts of dissolving the individual musical instrument and the individual musician and to make it reappear in another form.

A sonic as well as human synthesis.

He explains the concept of this sound as follows:

“Imagine you enter a room with vibrant acoustics, such as a cafe full of people having conversations, and when you’re close to those conversations you hear the language and understand the words. If you step away from the tables, however, and stand in the doorway, you begin to loose the ability to distinguish the words from one another. Now instead of hearing the individual conversations, melts all the conversations together, and transform into a one new sound. A sound of people without words and language. Just as when you hear a group of geese squawk, or the wind in tree tops, a kind of nature given sound of people. Once the language is dissolved and the words stop making sense, what is left, is the sound."

Niels Lyhne Løkkegaard is interested in exploring the sensuousness of sound, and he wants his music to stimulate new ways of approaching sound.

Løkkegaard often works with music instruments not only as sources of sound but also as cultural markers embedded within different systems and hierarchies. This being a driver in Løkkegaards work has led into compositions of music that can be performed by musicians as well as non-musicians - all revolving around the focus on how to create a safe environment for performing music, and dissolve shame or trauma connected with a particular music instrument and the act of performing music in general

“I try to reinvent the instrument from a constructive zero even though that might be a utopian quest filled with paradoxes, impossibilities and ramifications” and continues: ”I work with multiplication and layering of sound, as a way to make the wellknown sound dissolve and reappear as another sound. A sonic as well as human synthesis."

In the SOUND X SOUND series Niels Lyhne Løkkegaard seeks to create music that lets the instruments transcend their inherent sonic norms and reappear in other forms. In the work series SOUND X SOUND he explores this by way of multiplication and layering of sound.  

The multiplication brings out new timbral phenomena, interference of sound waves and vibrations, and brings out what Niels Lyhne Løkkegaard calls the sound’s potential of transformation. He describes this as the quality in a musical piece, when you no longer hear recognizable instruments, but instead the individual sound, as well as the individual musician, is dissolved into the collective sound.