9 May 2016
Making a splash: Let’s hear it for the first underwater band
Sandrine Ceurstemont checks out AquaSonic, the world's first aquatic music ensemble, and discovers that the trick to singing in the bath is not to blow bubbles
Haunting yet melodic music emerges from five giant aquariums on a stage. In each tank, a submerged musician is playing an instrument underwater or singing, seemingly defying the laws of nature.
Producing sound in water isn’t easy and perhaps unsurprisingly few musicians have taken on the challenge. Since the acoustics are completely different from those that pertain in air, most instruments don’t work underwater. But after 10 years of experimentation, singer and composer Laila Skovmand and her band, AquaSonic, are preparing for their first concert at a festival in Rotterdam on 27 May.
“It’s wild, it’s been a long trip,” says Skovmand. “I will be lying at the bottom of a tank and singing, using a technique I came up with myself.”
Aquasonic
Skovmand’s first experiments with aquatic singing involved submerging her mouth in a kitchen bowl filled with water and trying to produce a steady vibrato. During a diving trip, she then had the chance to try singing underwater. It worked but generated a lot of bubbles, adding popping sounds to the vocals.
To prevent this, Skovmand came up with a technique where she keeps an air bubble in her mouth and sings through it when submerged, rising to the top about every minute to take in a breath and a new bubble. “There is also a technique where I switch between singing on the exhale and inhale,” she says. “But it can be hard to control.” Due to the small amount of ...
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