PROGRAM 2026
ATIDARYMAS
Nancie Naive x KARY16.00 Open House guided tour,
16.30 performance
Space: Marriege Palace
18.00 Vinyl Record Listening Session
Space: Rupert
FREE EVENT
FREE TRIAL
Edgy Palates16.00 virtual discussion with Kotryna Lingienė
17.00 performance
Space: Laisvės alėja, Kaunas IN, Leticija
FREE EVENT
ĮVIETINTOS IR ĮLYTINTOS
Workshop15.00 lecture
16.30 workshops
Space: Medūza
FREE EVENT, registration required
HELLO, WORLD
The only site-specific music festival in Lithuania, “Muzika erdvėje”, explores the relationship between humans, the sonic environment, and space, inviting audiences to reflect navigation between reality and virtuality—and how this impacts life, creative methods, and mutual connections.
The code for the 12th edition of the festival is “HELLO, WORLD” – the very first message in programming language, which in this context opens up an in-betweenness, a space where we are neither here nor there at the same time.
Festival takes place on September 8 – 19 in Vilniuje and Kaunas.
The only site-specific music festival in Lithuania, “Muzika erdvėje”, explores the relationship between humans, the sonic environment, and space, inviting audiences to reflect navigation between reality and virtuality—and how this impacts life, creative methods, and mutual connections.
The code for the 12th edition of the festival is “HELLO, WORLD” – the very first message in programming language, which in this context opens up an in-betweenness, a space where we are neither here nor there at the same time. According to the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze, virtuality is by no means opposed to reality, but rather an integral part of it. What seems “real” to us is merely one of many realizations of virtual possibilities.
The festival program will unfold this theme through the perspectives of creators and researchers from various fields: KARY, Nancie Naive, Rasa Murauskaitė, Natalija Arlauskaitė, Laima Kreivytė, Zubin Kanga, Alexander Schubert, Ben Nobuto, Lukas Butkus, “Edgy Palates”, Sarah Davachi, “NO HAY BANDA”, Karolis Zajauskas, and Natas Kunas. Alongside musical premieres and artistic events, the context will be expanded through tours, creative workshops, and discussions exploring the themes of the Anthropocene, gender representation, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, and spacetime.
Organized by: Culture Agency “Miške”
Festival Artistic Directors: Marta Finkelštein x Agnė Matulevičiūtė
Festival Producer: Liucina Mackialo
Designer: Normatonis
Technical Director: Dovydas Kiela
Light design: Justas Bø
Communication coordinator: Viktorija Aprimaitė
Funded by: Lithuanian Council for Culture, Kaunas City Municipality
Strategic Partner: Lithuanian Composers’ Union
Venue Partners: Rupert, Vilnius Municipality, Kaunas IN, Leticija, Sapieha Palace, Medūza, Museum of Energy and Technology, LNDM Radvila Palace, GG Arena
Other Partners: Open House, LRT, Vilniaus Galerijų Savaitgalis
www.muzikaerdveje.lt
PAGRINDINIAI PARTNERIAI
Organizuoja
Finansuoja
Finansuoja
Finansuoja
Strateginis partneris
BILIETAI
ERDVIŲ PARTNERIAI
KITI PARTNERIAI
Nancie Naive x KARY
OPENING
Festival opening event
Space: Marriage palace / Rupert
Date & time:
2026.09.08
16.00 / 18.00
Artists:
Nancie Naive (Emilė Skolevičiūtė) KARY (Anton Karyuk)
16:00 Guided tour by Open House
16:30 Nancie Naive | “Oh Yes” / “O Taip” performance / premiere
18:00 KARY | Konvencija vinyl record listening session
The festival opening features an interdisciplinary approach to sound across two locations in Vilnius’ Naujamiestis district. Two prominent contemporary artists, Nancie Naive (Emilė Skolevičiūtė) and KARY (Anton Karyuk), will present their sociopolitically charged works.
Nancie Naive | “Oh Yes” / “O Taip”
Performance
Nancie Naive chose the Vilnius Marriage Palace—a space for constructing social identity where marriages becomes official, birth and death certificates are issued, and names, residences, or social statuses are altered. In her performance Oh Yes, the artist draws attention to the concepts of consent and the institution of marriage, questioning their boundaries by reflecting on the position of women in acts of consent, marriage, and societal structures. Simultaneously, the late-Soviet architectural landmark designed by Gediminas Baravykas shapes the spatial context—weaving together recent decades of Lithuanian history, which hold both Western neoliberalism and a complex relationship with Soviet-era culture and Christian conservatism.
In collaboration with OPEN HOUSE, we invite you to a tour of the Vilnius Marriage Palace before the performance at 4:00 PM, exploring the context of the space and its architectural highlights.
KARY | Convention (Konvencija)
Vinyl Record Listening Session
In the piece Convention, visual artist Anton Karyuk—performing under the name KARY—makes an intriguing shift into the field of experimental music, utilizing AI tools to realize his concept. Through this process, the artist raises questions about authorship, meaning, and the increasingly blurred line between human intention and machine-generated form.
The choice of the project’s theme stemmed from personal frustration: during public debates regarding the ratification of the Istanbul Convention in Lithuania, the artist encountered aggressive comments that were frequently homophobic and transphobic. As a queer artist, his reaction was not anger, but rather confusion mixed with irony. It became evident that the ideological opposition in the social sphere was being formed without any actual insight into the text of the document itself.
VILNIUS
09.08
KAUNAS
09.10
Edgy Palates
FREE TRIAL
Music performance
Space:
LIVE (discussion) Laisvės alėja, Kaunas IN, Leticija
Date ir time:
2026.09.10
16:00 / 17:00
Discusion moderator: Kotryna Lingienė
Artists: Edgy Palates (Dainora Aleksaitė, Ieva Parnarauskaitė ir Jūra Elena Šedytė)
16:00 virtual discusion with Kotryna Lingiene
17:00 „Free Trial“ – music performance
16:00 Virtual Discussion
A virtual discussion titled “In the Spotlight: Identity, Security, Sound” will take place, raising the following questions:
Where does my skin end and the feed begin? Where does digital representation end and the authentic self begin? What does it mean to be a “human-as-content” when you are monitored 24/7?
The discussion “In the Spotlight: Identity, Security, Sound” explores security, long-distance love, and art compressed into 15-second frames; the fragile boundary between passion and addiction; the safety of the creator; and the future of cultural consumption in the age of hyper-accessibility.
Moderator: Kotryna Lingienė Speakers:
Edita Pocinaitė-Janickė — cyberpsychology analyst
Karolis Lasys — interdisciplinary artist, researcher, and founder of the online radio station “Broken Teeth Radio”
Marta Finkelštein and Agnė Matulevičiūtė — artistic directors of the ‘Muzika Erdvėje’ festival
LIVE on Muzika Erdvėje Facebook
17:00 FREE TRIAL performance
Specially for this year’s festival “Muzika erdvėje” (Music in Surroundings), a new composition has been created and its theme “HELLO, WORLD” is reinterpreted by a prominent contemporary music collective known for its original approach to programming and spatial contexts – “Edgy Palates.”
“Edgy Palates” is an ensemble of composers and performers Dainora Aleksaitė, Ieva Parnarauskaitė, and Jūra Elena Šedytė, exploring the intersections of vocal and electroacoustic music with sound poetry. Paying special attention to extended vocal techniques, the creators aim to highlight the unique capabilities of the human voice, presenting their singing as a study of distinct instruments.
“Free Trial” is a musical performance on Kaunas’ Laisvės Alėja (Liberty Avenue), where shop windows become screens and bodies become content. The members of the experimental vocal trio “Edgy Palates” embody the figures of a human hybrid existing between the body and the screen – a human dissolved in the flow of images, data, and the digital economy. The performance speaks to constant visibility, the transformation of humans into visual content, and questions whether there is still room for authentic sonic expression in today’s reality, or if everything is overshadowed by visual language.
Muzika Erdvėje
ĮVIETINTOS IR ĮLYTINTOS
Workshop
Space:
Medūza
Date ir time:
2026.09.12
15:00 / 16.30
Participants:
Laima Kreivytė, Natalija Arlauskaitė ir Rasa Murauskaitė-Juškienė
15:00 PRE-ACTION. Case Studies Laima Kreivytė, Natalija Arlauskaitė, and Rasa Murauskaitė-Juškienė will present the feminist thematic field, covering the most compelling researchers, movements, and initiatives in their respective areas. The event is open to the public.
16:30 ACTION. Active Action Group An active group of participants, together with the researchers, will develop an action strategy that will take a tangible physical or conceptual form—such as a manifesto, programming recommendations for festivals, or a performance. This will be a practical outcome based on co-creation.
This is an invitation from the festival’s artistic directors, Agnė Matulevičiūtė and Marta Finkelštein, to create a momentum in the field of academic music together with their field research leaders Laima Kreivytė, Natalija Arlauskaitė, and Rasa Murauskaitė-Juškienė. Drawing on best practices in curating, creation, and analysis from other fields, the project aims to activate feminist discourse in the music, and most importantly, to co-create practical tools for real change.
While feminist discourse in contemporary art, literature, and media has already established new perspectives, programming trends, and awareness regarding gender inclusion, academic music institutions still operate in parallel mode, deeply embedding and replicating patriarchal models. Although feminist narratives do exist, they do not deeply impact the broader discourse and practices. Concert programs and festivals are still visibly dominated by male creators, who are prioritized for new commissions or musicological research.
VILNIUS
09.12
VILNIUS
09.13
Zubin Kanga x Alexander Schubert x Ben Nobuto x Lukas Butkus
WIKI-PIANO
Concert
Space:
Sapieha Palace
Date ir time:
2026.09.13
16:30 / 17:00
Artist: Zubin Kanga Composers: Alexander Schubert (GER), Ben Nobuto (UK), Lukas Butkus (LT)
16:30 Guided Tour
17:00 Concert
Alexander Schubert (GER) composition Wiki-Piano.Net
Beno Nobuto (UK) audiovisual composition „The Art of Sinking“
Lukas Butkus (LT) premiere – „Anatomy of Melancholy“ for piano and video
Pianist, composer, and technology researcher Zubin Kanga is a leading international figure exploring how artificial intelligence, motion sensors, and hybrid instruments expand the performer’s identity. Having performed the world premieres of over 170 works at major music festivals (including the BBC Proms, Gaudeamus Festival, Klang Festival, and many others), the artist presents his program, WIKI-PIANO, at the festival. Here, technology functions not as an external tool, but as a living, constantly evolving extension of our reality, reacting to the integrally shifting forms of real and virtual worlds.
The program features three compositions. The iconic Wiki-Piano.Net by Alexander Schubert (GER) is an interactive piece for piano and the internet community, with a constantly evolving score that changes through a wiki-style webpage format*. Ben Nobuto’s (UK) audiovisual composition, The Art of Sinking, explores the shifts in human subconsciousness within the context of virtuality. The program is conceptually expanded by premiere of Lukas Butkus’s (LT) – Anatomy of Melancholy, for piano and video, which mediates the historical theme of melancholy through internet artifacts and post-ironic digital fragmentation.
Karolis Zajauskas x Natas Kunas
ECHO
Interdisciplinary performance
Space:
Liepkalnis water storage facility
Date ir time:
2026.09.16
18:00 / 18.30
Director: Karolis Zajauskas, Composer: Natas Kunas, Scenographer: Justas Sabastijanskas, Actors: Dita Klinkaitė, Gustas Vičkačka
18:00 Guided Tour
18:30 Interdisciplinary performance ‘Echo’
The interdisciplinary performance “Echo” (created by director Karolis Zajauskas and composer Natas Kunas), presented within the context of the festival’s theme Hello, World, opens up an Anthropocene perspective—a noisy intervention of human technology into nature.
The foundation of the piece – Ovid’s Metamorphoses, which tells the myth of the nymph Echo, cursed to eternally repeat the words of others. Here, Echo is no longer a nymph protecting nature, but rather a human-made Echo—a system of technological vibrations and noise polluting the underwater world. Throughout the performance, the pulsing of ship engines, sonar signals, and the drone of metal create an industrial violence that disrupts the natural connections of the environment. Ritualistic actions performed by two actors—ranging from the precise filtration of industrial water to the figure of a modern mermaid washed ashore—give form to this desacralisation, where the digital echo of humanity irreversibly alters physical reality.
The performance seamlessly merges sound, experimental cinema, and theater. Utilizing authentic sounds recorded at Lithuanian dams and harbors, it transforms the Liepkalnis water reservoir into a giant “listening chamber.” This intensely reverberant infrastructural space serves not as a mere backdrop, but as an integral part of the performance’s dramaturgy: an emptied vessel in which the memory of the water that once filled it still resonates.
VILNIUS
09.16
VILNIUS
09.19
NO HAY BANDA
CLOSING
Concert
Space:
LNDM Radvila Palace, South wing
Date & time:
2026.09.19
18:00 / 18.30
Atlieka:
NO HAY BANDA
18:00 Guided Tour
18:30 Concert “Three Unisons for Four Voices”, composer Sarah Davachi
The closing event of the festival will feature international guests from Canada – NO HAY BANDA. This Montreal-based avant-garde music collective was awarded the prestigious Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation Ensemble Prize (2026), proving their innovative approach to the field of contemporary music. The ensemble will reinterpret the festival’s theme HELLO, WORLD through an experience of deep listening. This concert is like a test – how much we are still capable of existing in analog states.
Ensemble will present an exclusive piece to the audience “Three Unisons for Four Voices” commissioned specifically for the ensemble by Sarah Davachi, one of the most prominent creators of contemporary ambient and experimental music. It is a 70-minute acoustic experience for strings, winds, percussion, and the Ondes Martenot electronic instrument. As the performers gradually synchronize and then drift out of sync with one another, the listener’s ears begin to focus on the acoustic spaces in between, prompting the question of what it actually means to experience sound as whole and in unison.
Before the concert a tour will take place. It will reveal a multi-layered perspective on time considering Vilnius that is constantly changing and undergoing gentrification. A perspective that also resonates in the experience of listening to the concert. The Radvilos were one of the most famous aristocratic families in Lithuanian history, renowned not only for their military exploits and political achievements but also for their excellent education and artistic taste. However, the fate of Jonušas Radvila’s palace was not as successful as that of the family in whose name it is known today. Built in the 17th century, the palace passed from hand to hand over a long period of time; it was blown up, abandoned, and restored, with different parts of the palace complex changing in appearance and function. All these traces of history can be seen today – the stories of the palace’s past embedded in its walls hold equally vivid visions of the future, which tour participants will be introduced to.