This is a demo for Embodied Dialogues, a collaboration-in-progress between Jenn Kirby and Iris Garrelfs, that merges body movement, wearable technology, and extended vocal improvisation. The performance features Kirby’s Sensor Dress, a wearable instrument that generates sound through the performer’s movement, and Garrelfs' unamplified voice. Sensor Dress is equipped with capacitive touch sensors and motion tracking, enabling real-time interaction between body, dress, and sound. As Garrelfs moves among the audience, her vocalizations activate the dress's sensors, triggering an array of pre-recorded sounds—ranging from electroacoustic and body-sourced sounds to environmental recordings—while her voice remains unprocessed. The performance creates an intimate and immersive dialogue between performer, audience, body, and space. The integration of wearables, voice, and motion highlights the tactile, organic aspects of sound-making and draws on unpredictability in live improvisation. The work challenges traditional notions of control and controllers in performance, inviting both performer and audience into an ephemeral, postdigital experience. By exploring the intersection of digital musical instruments, human-computer interaction, and embodied expression, Embodied Dialogues offers new insights into how wearables can expand the possibilities of improvised performance, emphasizing the agency of the performer and the fluidity of interaction between body, technology, space and sound.

Embodied Dialogues

Irish composer, performer, software developer and lecturer based in Liverpool. Work ranges from instrumental composition, to electroacoustic, to live electronics. 

This space is primarily for instrumental work. Electronic and experimental-pop works are available on bandcamp.