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Radiophrenia Redux: Nwando Ebizie / Alexandra Spence / Rebecca Wilcox (Audio)

Mar 21, 2022
Produced by Radiophrenia.

This monthly program features highlights and commissions from Glasgow art radio station Radiophrenia. Presented in today's episode is Fire Prevention / Or / How to sing a labyrinth / Or / The rebeing and the burning of the labyrinth by Nwando Ebizie, Bell, fern by Alexandra Spence, and Night Edge by Rebecca Wilcox.

Fire Prevention
Or
How to sing a labyrinth
Or
The rebeing and the burning of the labyrinth
by Nwando Ebizie

An experiment in audio-ing a labyrinth; tangling and untangling the thwarted pathways of a mythopoetisised history towards a transformational fire ritual.
How to weave a story into being when I am caught, tangled in the middle
How to reach the crux when the wyrding way turns me about and about and I know the point is far away. And I have to crawl on bandaged knee to get there
How to share a journey when you were never there to feel the stony ground
What rough beast is waiting, waiting to be born in the embers
When were they burned?
The task of the wild woman is to open and be opened
The doors of perception are always just beyond reach but a constant cycle of life death life, of re-initiation will bestow many keys
The labyrinth will determine the correct key
And you are the whole
The task of the wild woman is to open eyes and open thighs and allow the light to pour in
To pull the thread and follow around the walkways
Then gather it all together and weave the tapestry of her own existence
To gather dead stuff, lay it down, sing over it, breathe from the vagas enraptured soul and begin again, remake the broken body and sing the old song until it is new.
We travel through time and space while we listen
You my friend and I
I guide you and you guide me
Maybe by the end of you listening to me I will have the answers

Commissioned for Radiophrenia 2020 with the support of Creative Scotland.
This piece includes binaural recordings, headphone listening is welcomed.

Bell, fern by Alexandra Spence

Bell, fern explores my ongoing fascination in the animation and translation of material and object through sound. It was developed in and inspired by a residency period spent in Hong Kong, 2019. And is to be released on Room40 later this year, mastered by Lawrence English.

gauzy construction cloth in green, yellow, white and blue
it swells and ripples in the wind.
bamboo scaffolding – somehow more obvious
organic against inorganic material.
lush, vibrant green baby ferns, small and waving in the breeze
a necessary softness after all the hard concrete.
flashing orange construction lights
orange against the hazy night time, luminous blue.
piles of rubble and floating plastic line the beaches
dusty grey, white, monotonous and bright, candy colours.

Night Edge by Rebecca Wilcox

A short poem, interfered with breath and an echoing shopping centre. Rebecca Wilcox lives in Glasgow and works with writing, audio and performance, often using voice as a tool. She is interested in processes of apperception as they disturb our habits of attention.


Presented on an annual basis, Radiophrenia is a temporary art radio station – a two-week exploration into current trends in sound and transmission arts. Broadcasting live from Glasgow’s Centre for Contemporary Arts, the station promoted radio as an art form, encouraging challenging and radical new approaches to the medium. Each year, the broadcast schedule includes a series of newly commissioned radio works, live shows, pre-recorded features and 12 Live-to-Air performances. The majority of the program is made up from selections submitted to an international open call for sound art and radio works. Radiophrenia is managed by Mark Vernon and Barry Burns and is funded through Creative Scotland’s Open Project Funding with additional support from CCA Glasgow.