Dorothée Hahne

Tintinabula [6/2023]

(lat. bells, ringing, chiming).

A sound and movement study for the digitised sounds of 5 unexploded bombs used as bells.

Bells – melted down for cannons. And guns that became bells. As early as the Middle Ages, bells were melted down in times of war to make guns from the metal. It is also reported that in times of peace, bells were cast from the melted down metal of the guns.

The unexploded ordnance from World War II, which is heard here as bells, was defused by the explosive ordnance disposal service and sawn up for emptying. What remained were rusty steel shells that sound like pure as well as dissonant bells and were digitised in studio recordings. The steel shells have a wall thickness of about 1 cm. The size of the duds ranges from approx. 80 cm in length and 40 cm in diameter to the smallest variant of approx. 40 cm in length. The empty weight of the largest variant is over 170 kg. It is unimaginable that such things “fell from the sky” in times that should never be repeated.

The bell sounds of the duds and their electronic adaptations meet sonically and spatially in a sound space sounded by four loudspeakers. Their vibrations and proportions meet, interweave and move with each other and fill the space.

Composition commissioned by the Archdiocese of Paderborn for the festival “blau – experimentelle musik im kirchenraum”.

Performances: