This workshop, led by Thomas Teurlai and Clarice Calvo-Pinsolle, invites participants to explore the hidden sounds of everyday machines. Through an experimental and collective approach, participants will build their own listening devices using components salvaged from discarded electrical and electronic appliances.

Participants are encouraged to bring old household appliances, power tools, or any object containing copper coils, motors, or magnets that can be dismantled in order to recover their components. Together, we will identify, disassemble, and repurpose these elements to build DIY electromagnetic microphones capable of revealing the electromagnetic fields emitted by machines.

The first day will be dedicated to fabrication and hands-on experimentation: dismantling the objects brought by participants, salvaging components, and building both electromagnetic microphones and piezo microphones capable of capturing internal vibrations, resonances, and mechanical movements.

The second day will focus on sound exploration. Using the microphones built on the previous day, participants will record and manipulate in real time the sounds produced by coils, motors, and electronic circuits. We will work with the free and open-source software BESPOKE to transform these sonic materials into digital instruments and create our own synthesizers from the collected sounds. By combining electromagnetic and vibrational sensing with sound synthesis, we will collectively compose a mechanical orchestration that reveals the hidden sonic dynamics of these technical objects.

This workshop is open to everyone. No prior knowledge of sound, electronics, or music production is required.

This 2-days masterclass takes place on Saturday 27 + Sunday 28.06.2026, from 10:00 to 18:00

Languages: EN/FR

Participants are invited to bring old household appliances, electronic tools, machines and anything that we can take apart to salvage components.