It’s true that inspiration can be found anywhere. In Sara Persico’s case, it was a building in Lebanon by the renowned Oscar Niemeyer that became the starting point of her new album, titled Sphaîra, out today via Subtext Recordings.
“When I first heard about the Rachid Karami International Fair, I was touring in Beirut with other artists, and we decided to spend a day in Tripoli and go to the Fair. Once there, we experimented playfully with the dome’s captivating acoustics,” she tells us in this exclusive interview. “At the time, I had no specific plan, and even when I returned a year later for a field recording session, I wasn’t entirely sure why I was doing it.” But somehow, after re-listening to those audios once she was back in Berlin, where she lives, she saw their potential and decided to explore it further.
The result is a highly atmospheric, enveloping album consisting of eleven tracks. They’re dark, sometimes even uncomfortable, but incredibly interesting to listen to and get lost to. Their texture and abstraction suck listeners in and allow their imagination to run wild — what are we listening to exactly? What does this remind you of? What images come to your head when you hear those sounds? To celebrate the release of her new LP, today we sit down with Sara to discuss the influence of Napoli vs Berlin in her work, bridging architecture and music, and her upcoming gig at Sónar Barcelona (in June).
Ciao Sara, it’s a pleasure to speak with you. How are you today and where do you answer us from?
Ciao Arnau, it’s a pleasure to speak with you too. I’m answering form Napoli — I’m spending a few days here with my family after giving a workshop at the Conservatory of L’Aquila, a city two hours and a half away from here.
You’re originally from Napoli but are currently based in Berlin. They’re very contrasting cities: the former is cheerful, loud, Mediterranean, luminous and colourful, while the latter is dark, more rigorous and serious, and also quieter. How would you say both places inform you as a person and an artist?
Napoli is a high-intensity, inspiring, chaotic city — volcanic in every sense. I owe a lot of my energy to it, as well as the ability to solve problems and make things work with limited resources. That’s the spirit of the place, always ready to take action, senses fully on. I feel good walking through the city, trying to find my rhythm in it, both during the day and at night. My rule is a brisk walk. The streets are full of art and architecture, so you can easily lose yourself in its layers.
Berlin, on the other hand, feels more individualistic, darker (even more so now), and strict about rules (especially in supermarkets). But when I moved there six years ago, I was so thirsty for music and art that I just wanted to experience as much as possible. In that sense, it was the right place to be. It’s also a good place to zoom out ‘cause everyone is an artist there, so telling people you make music isn’t particularly exciting. Still, I’ve grown as an artist, found space to experiment, and received a lot of support. In the end, that’s what Berlin is for most of us: the people you cross paths with, often searching for something just like you.
Berlin, on the other hand, feels more individualistic, darker (even more so now), and strict about rules (especially in supermarkets). But when I moved there six years ago, I was so thirsty for music and art that I just wanted to experience as much as possible. In that sense, it was the right place to be. It’s also a good place to zoom out ‘cause everyone is an artist there, so telling people you make music isn’t particularly exciting. Still, I’ve grown as an artist, found space to experiment, and received a lot of support. In the end, that’s what Berlin is for most of us: the people you cross paths with, often searching for something just like you.
You’re presenting Sphaîra, your debut album. In it, you transform the acoustics of the Rachid Karami International Fair’s Experimental Theatre in Tripoli (Lebanon) into uncanny, real-world textures. I know you visited the place in 2022, but how did the idea come to be? Meaning, when you stepped inside it, you knew instantly you wanted to use it as your muse or inspiration?
When I first heard about the Rachid Karami International Fair, I was touring in Beirut with other artists, and we decided to spend a day in Tripoli and go to the Fair. Once there, we experimented playfully with the dome’s captivating acoustics, the experimental theatre designed by Oscar Niemeyer. At the time, I had no specific plan, and even when I returned a year later for a field recording session, I wasn’t entirely sure why I was doing it. I suppose I was simply searching for cool sounds to incorporate into my music. I often rely on intuition — sometimes, overplanning can be counterproductive in artistic practice. It was only after listening back to the recordings that I realised I wanted to focus on them entirely. They deserved my full attention and became the focal point of my last work.
The music you make is extremely textured and layered. It creates soundscapes that transport you to parallel universes and weird, dark, unexplored places. What is your creative process like?
My creative process can be very different each time, which is fun. In my last album, Sphaîra, I decided to fully concentrate on the field recordings I took at the dome in Lebanon, and this choice was actually liberating because there is so much sound and possibility out there and sometimes I get lost. Setting a kind of ‘rule’ or ‘limitation’ for the album gave me a sense of direction and strength in exploring the recordings.
In my studio in Berlin, I worked with Belgian sound designer Koenraad Ecker, who is also one of my closest friends, to develop techniques for processing the field recordings. He has a unique ability to understand sound in-depth, and I feel grateful to have collaborated with him; it shifted my perspective in many ways, opened up my vision.
In my studio in Berlin, I worked with Belgian sound designer Koenraad Ecker, who is also one of my closest friends, to develop techniques for processing the field recordings. He has a unique ability to understand sound in-depth, and I feel grateful to have collaborated with him; it shifted my perspective in many ways, opened up my vision.
“I never mean to make my music unpleasant, but I do like to explore the uncomfortable.”
In what ways?
More specifically, we sampled sections of the recordings, processed them through analogue effects, and used a tape machine to record and pitch sounds down, layered and manipulated my voice as both textural and structural elements, and experimented with impulse response and convolution reverb to explore the spatial qualities of the space in the recordings.
In this LP, architecture plays a pivotal role. What’s your relationship with it [architecture] like, and how do you link this artistic practice to music/sound creation?
I grew up surrounded by incredible architecture. It was part of my life before I even consciously realised it, as I spent so much time in Napoli’s historical centre as a teenager, then while studying at the Conservatory. But this album is my first experience connecting sound so directly to a specific place (and probably not the last). It felt extremely natural, especially since the dome itself was conceived as a sound installation.
Firas El Hallak is a young filmmaker from Tripoli who helped me gain access to the dome with my equipment the day I recorded. He also created a project based on the dome, including a series of concerts he filmed inside it — definitely worth checking out.
Firas El Hallak is a young filmmaker from Tripoli who helped me gain access to the dome with my equipment the day I recorded. He also created a project based on the dome, including a series of concerts he filmed inside it — definitely worth checking out.
Exploring the building sonically must’ve been thrilling, such a sense of discovery and adventure. What first caught your attention of that place?
Singing inside the dome is a unique experience, as is interacting with the natural effects that emerge when making sound. There’s also a mysterious ‘whispering effect’: if someone speaks softly, their voice reaches you even from the other side of the dome. It’s as if the space has its own rules when it comes to sound.
You made the building resonate by singing, screaming, whispering, moving objects, and generating sounds using metal plates suspended from the theatre’s roof. Was there a lot of improvisation and trial and error, or was there thorough planning involved?
I’m not someone who overplans, but I had an idea of the type of sounds I could generate, so I searched for them through improvisation: singing, screaming, humming, moving objects, and interacting with the metal panels hanging from the ceiling which are part of the installation. At the same time, the recording session was about letting the space itself resonate with the sounds of the city, so I spent part of the time simply listening to everything around me.
Was there a specific place in the theatre that sounded ‘better’ than others, or in a more special way? Like the dome, or the stairs, or the hall, or…
Standing exactly in the middle of the theatre was the best spot to make sounds, especially to sing.
“The reason I do what I do is my interest in research, experimentation, and the unknown it can generate.”
Listening to Rashid Karami, it somehow reminded me of reptiles crawling or meandering on the ground. It’s such an intense feeling, like you’re close to the soil or even being buried alive. It feels like straight out of a horror movie. Do you ever seek your music to be unpleasant, somehow?
Wow, thanks for sharing your visual experience and feelings toward Rachid Karami, it’s really interesting to hear. To me, the dome in that track feels like a living organism, with the elements inside constantly moving, almost like the sounds you hear in your stomach. I just remembered something I’d like to mention: before I returned to Tripoli to record, a Lebanese friend told me that the army had used the dome to torture captives during the civil war that broke out in 1975, amplifying their voices in agony… Somehow, you can sense this haunting presence in the space. There’s both darkness and light resonating together. Later, I realised this felt like a metaphor for the world we’re experiencing today.
I never mean to make my music unpleasant, but I do like to explore the uncomfortable. When you encounter a sound you’ve never heard before, especially if it’s intense or imposing, it can trigger a kind of rejection at first. But when you listen again, knowing what to expect, you start to absorb it differently, allowing it to enter your world.
I never mean to make my music unpleasant, but I do like to explore the uncomfortable. When you encounter a sound you’ve never heard before, especially if it’s intense or imposing, it can trigger a kind of rejection at first. But when you listen again, knowing what to expect, you start to absorb it differently, allowing it to enter your world.
Speaking of horror movies, I think you’d be great at doing a score for one. Has this thought ever crossed your mind? Do you see yourself jumping into it in the future?
I never thought of scoring a horror movie, although I’m watching a bunch of old Japanese horror at the moment and I find it really inspiring. I am certainly interested in working with cinema, I actually can’t wait for it to happen.
I feel like you must wear headphones (big, ear-covering, not just AirPods) to fully ‘live’ your music — it creates such an enveloping atmosphere and 3D sound effect. Is there a perfect or optimal way you’d recommend listeners to experience it?
Listening with good headphones is definitely a highly recommended way to experience my music. But it’s also really enjoyable on a quality hi-fi stereo system or monitors. My only suggestion is to take a moment to listen to the album in its entirety, without interruption.
In June we’ll be seeing you at Sónar Barcelona. How do you aim to bring such an enveloping, atmospheric album to a live setting? What are you working on to make it 3D in the physical world?
I will present Sphaîra with visual artist Mika Oki, who created a light scenography for the audiovisual performance. We premiered it at Berlin Atonal last year, and it was an incredible experience to see our worlds collide so beautifully, just like a perfect match. We are really excited to bring the performance to Sónar.
I guess you enjoy being in a more niche, conceptual sphere, but do you ever think: fuck it, let’s go commercial, make some pop hits, and try to make real money out of it?
I think I would get extremely bored with that choice. The reason I do what I do is my interest in research, experimentation, and the unknown it can generate, as well as the challenge of pushing my own boundaries. I was never drawn to the idea of catering to audience expectations or market demands; it would feel like being trapped in a cage. But you never really know what life might bring, right?
