Music is beautiful, art on a pole, animatronic crabs.

Lia Kohl's April Newsletter

Hi buddies,

It’s April! The forsythia bush outside our house has burst into flower (impossibly yellow), and the redbuds in Tennessee and Kentucky are clouding the hills with pink-purple. I spent the month in many different places, making music and meeting new people and seeing old friends. I played on a boat and in a converted barn and a venue that used to be a squash court. A person on the train in Lyon passed me and my cello and my luggage and said music is beautiful! and kept walking.

Here I am in Porto and Paris

The world is, meanwhile, full of heavy news. One of the wisest people I know often reminds me, be where your feet are. A lifelong effort. It doesn’t mean to put your head in the sand (tempting) but rather, pay attention - right in front of you is someone you can love.

Paris, Stockholm, western Sweden

Professional tidbits:

Whitney Johnson and I’s duo album, For Translucence, is out in the world! Grab a copy if you haven’t already. We’re celebrating the release later this month at Three Top Lounge at the Salt Shed:

My show at Roman Susan, The Sound is in the Telling, was up all month. It was mostly sound installations responding to the soundscape around the gallery, which I’ll probably share at some point, but also these embroidered sound poems:

My brilliant friend Jesse Malmed made a gallery out of a pole on Western Avenue and I made this piece for it, which is up this week:

Thinking about the outer edges of being alive, how different they can be for each of us, how similar, what it sounds like.

A few shows:

4.3 Honestly Same + release show for Macie Stewart’s When the Distance is Blue (I’m playing in both bands!): Constellation, Chicago

4.4 Solo, opening for Daniel Lanois: Epiphany Center, Chicago

4.6 Solo, opening for Flore Laurentienne: Constellation Chicago

4.9 Trio with Whitney Johnson and Macie Stewart, improvising a live score for The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari: Chicago Humanities Festival @ The Music Box, Chicago

4.24 Release Show for Whitney Johnson and I’s duo For Translucence: Three Top Lounge at the Salt Shed, Chicago

4.25 Duo with Whitney Johnson: Dear Mom, Indianapolis, IN

4.26 Duo with Whitney Johnson: Orbit Room, Bloomington, IN

Tiny recommendations:

1. This album of Norwegian folk music, which my Mama used to have on cassette, and I rediscovered because they were playing it on the radio in Sweden (!).

2. Wearing a watch. I bought a watch in the airport in Porto (I’ve always been curious about people who buy non-food in airports) and am enjoying knowing what time it is without looking at my phone. I considered also buying this animatronic crab, but refrained:

3. N got me an e-reader for my birthday (sometimes the most loving gifts are also very practical), and while I’m generally a paper book person, this one allows you to check out e-books from your local library and also doesn’t give money to Big Bad Jeff. I read a LOT this month and didn’t have to carry a bunch of heavy books in my suitcase.

4. Some favorites from my reading: Daniel Dutton’s Margaret the First, Rachel Cusk’s Parade, and Elizabeth Strout’s My Name is Lucy Barton.

5. Among a slew of mediocre plane movies, I really enjoyed the beautifully animated and surprisingly touching Linda veut du poulet (Chicken for Linda).

6. My friend Gaspar made trout by boiling herbs (parsley, thyme, rosemary) in salted water, turning off the burner and putting the (whole, cleaned) trout in for ten minutes. Perfectly cooked!

7. Mervellieux (as the name implies, marvelous) and Semla, a Swedish pastry filled with almond paste and whipped cream.

8. Walt McClements new album, On a Painted Ocean. Accordion!

9. The Trevor Project provides counseling and support to LGBTQ+ youth, more and more important these days.

   Special love to all my trans siblings, you make the world better and more beautiful.

10. Finally, very thin ice making high frequencies:

Solidarity + love, wherever you are.

that’s all, for now,

Lia