Listening Hymns | ILYICH

Listening Hymns is a performative spoken word archive.

Tracing ways of listening through the words of artists, musicians, poets, writers, cultural practitioners, educators, meditators, and activists, among others, the ever-growing selection of voices follows listening as both a performative and a sonic practice.

Engaging concrete and metaphorical domains of listening, the archive draws on themes of anti-racism and intersectional feminism, sonic and somatic practices, critical theory and abolitionism, spirit and ritual, allyship, community building, education, sound studies, politics, and everyday life, among many others.

Here, this ever-growing choir of voices is performed at Refuge Worldwide as part of ILYICH's artist residency, interwoven with live DJ sets, samplers, and percussion.

This episode circles around attention as a way of moving through change. We begin with Cecilia Vicuña, speaking from Minga for the Sea at Kunstnernes Hus in Oslo, where listening emerges as a matter of life and death. Mathematician Joel David Hamkins shares what it means for a mathematical system to be sound, where proofs preserve truth. Sociologist and cultural theorist Paul Gilroy reminds us that attention is a capacity that can be cultivated, and that learning to listen is the core of learning itself. Finally, bassist and educator Victor Wooten reminds us to take notes and listen.

This show reminds us that listening is not simply an act of hearing, but a practice of staying alive, seeking truth, cultivating attention, and attuning to change.