Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe
Film with Live Score / Music
Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe weaves together voice and modular synthesis for Nsenene, a live interpretation of the score to the film Grasshopper Republic. Filmed over three years in Uganda and directed by Daniel McCabe, this documentary follows a team of grasshopper trappers as they try ‘to catch the swarm.’
Lowe’s live score—shifting between falsetto incantations, resonant horns, and trembling electronics—creates a charged sonic ecosystem where sound mirrors survival and the precarious interdependence between humans and the natural world.
This live performance is the furthering of the Grasshopper Republic film collaboration between Lowe and McCabe. Unused footage and stems from the film’s score manifest as an A/V performance conceptualized by Lowe in which he investigates the elements of the score to create a new landscape.
An immersive documentary comprehensively filmed over the course of three seasons, Grasshopper Republic follows a local grasshopper trapping team, in verité style, as these modern-day prospectors push into remote forests and villages seeking their fortune by capturing this elusive prey by the barrel load. In deliberate contrast to this dystopian imposition, specialized macro cameras simultaneously transport the audience into an immersive natural world on a level with the perspective of the Grasshoppers. This film is an immersive exploration of this strange, beautiful, and dangerous predicament which examines the balance between communities and ecosystems.
The Dark: PS21’s fearless winter festival of live performance radiating across Columbia County
The Dark is a new annual festival from PS21 : Center for Contemporary Performance that celebrates and elevates the depths of winter. Taking place February 16–22, 2026, the festival will unfold at PS21 and across Columbia County—in theatres, restaurants, libraries, saunas, and outdoor public spaces. Featuring more than 60 international artists and over 80 performances, The Dark offers a packed week of world-class contemporary performance, installation, music, dance, and theatre—all exploring winter as a time of community and solitude, fire and ice, darkness and light. A major new attraction for the region, the festival positions Columbia County as a year-round cultural destination—not just a summer one.
It is a light in the dark—and The Dark is the light.
Secure your Festival Pass to The Dark now which includes tickets to every performance along with a complimentary sauna and ice skating session!
NSENENE was conceptualized in the wake of collaboration on the film Grasshopper Republic directed by Daniel McCabe, edited by Alyse Ardell Spiegel. As conversations would naturally initiate around the question of, how does the film exist outside of the cinema, this particular idea for an A/V performance materialized. Ultimately the idea was met by cutting collection of footage not used in the final film and engaging in a live reinterpretation of the score.
Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe is an artist, curator and composer that works primarily with, but not limited to voice and modular synthesizer for sound in the realm of spontaneous music. Along with analog video synthesis works, he has brought forth an A/V proposal that has been a focus of live performance and installation/exhibition.
The marriage of synthesis and the voice has allowed for a heightened physicality in the way of ecstatic music, both in a live setting and recorded. The sensitivity of analogue modular synthesis echoes the organic nature of vocal expression which in this case is meant to put forth a trancelike state.
As of late Robert has also put more focus on composition for film, both in solo scoring and collaboration. Over the last several years Robert has collaborated on projects or provided sound in a featured artist capacity for such films as End of Summer, Sicario, Arrival, Last and First Men with Johann Johannsson and It Comes at Night with Brian McOmber. Recently Robert has scored Il colpo del cane for Fulvio Risuleo, Candyman for Nia DaCosta, The Color of Care for Yance Ford and Master for Mariama Diallo.
On the subject of film, each score is meant to have a very specific voice and sonic palette, so each project is approached with clear intention. Creating a unique signature in composition and instrumentation for each is film is always most important.
Through collaboration Robert has worked with Ben Russell, Ben Rivers, Sabrina Ratté, Rose Lazar, Nicolas Becker, Jóhann Jóhannsson, Tarek Atoui, Hildur Guđnadóttir, Philippe Parreno, Evan Calder Williams, Ariel Kalma, Susie Ibarra, YoshimiO, Alexandra Wolkowicz, Biba Bell, ADULT., and Rose Kallal, as well as many others.
Movements in the broader symphony of Lowe’s score ambiently lavish the ears of viewers, while also carrying an unsettling undertone. Buried auditory passageways embedded deep inside of his tense, suspended collision of vocal and orchestral textures mimic and build upon the call-and-response tradition in African-American music that can be traced from sacred hymnals to the secular work songs that inform the 20th century continuum of the blues, jazz and soul.
DeForrest Brown Jr. on the score of CANDYMAN for NPR
Composer/Performer: Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe
Video edit: Alyse Ardell Spiegel/Daniel McCabe
First premiered in Birmingham, UK 2024 Supersonic Festival
The Dark is supported through a Market New York grant, awarded to PS21 : Center for Contemporary Performance from Empire State Development and I LOVE NY, New York State’s Division of Tourism.
Digital content coverage for The Dark is supported by Bloomberg Connects.
The Dark‘s business sponsors are Millay Arts and The Mountains Media.
Thank you to the many generous individual supporters who helped fund The Dark.
PS21’s programs are made possible in part with support from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.
While this performance does not have reserved seating, we are happy to accommodate any specific accessibility needs.
Please reach out to Adriana at boxoffice@ps21chatham.org, and she will coordinate with our front-of-house team to ensure your experience is comfortable and enjoyable.
The Crandell Theatre offers complimentary devices to assist hearing-impaired patrons, including:
Assisted Listening: Hear amplified audio from the house speakers via headset.
Our staff are happy to help you select and set up a device to ensure a more enjoyable movie-going experience.
