Ömer Kurtuluş – Focus | FLYDLPHN sextet & fixed media | Bryan Hall, 2025

Focus is a work for FLYDLPHN sextet and fixed media that approaches sound as “sonic archaeology,” investigating how human cultures have used sound as a technology for entering sacred or transcendent states. Layers of sustained and cyclical resonance connect Tibetan singing-bowl gestures, finger-cymbal drones that echo continuous breath cycles from Aboriginal healing practices, the metallic friction of Chinese Baoding balls, and the circular bowing of the double bass, which translates the Sufi sema into a perpetual, spiraling motion. A fixed-media layer built from recordings of the bukkehorn—a traditional Scandinavian goat-horn associated with Norse shamanic and signaling practices—wraps the ensemble in a distant, ancestral call. Extended techniques throughout the piece function as “ritual technologies”: soft dynamics, fragile noises, and occasional rupturing attacks are arranged to create a shared listening space where sound acts as a tool for shifting consciousness. Instrumentation: flute / bass flute, bass clarinet in B♭, bassoon, Percussion I (bamboo wind chimes, vibraphone, singing bowl, woodblock), Percussion II (finger cymbals, snare drum, Chinese Baoding balls), double bass, and fixed media. Ensemble: FLYDLPHN. Composer: Ömer Kurtuluş.