The sound of the trees

Text: Jessica Krauß

Early in the morning, before dawn has even fully broken over Berlin, a concert of a very special kind begins under Susie Ibarra’s window. The blackbird begins with a short melodic solo ending on a trill, its song accompanied by the rustling of the horse chestnut leaves on the branches outside Ibarra’s window. For the artist, this is much more than just an acoustic welcome to the day – it is a dialogue with nature and a chance to immerse herself in a musical realm full of rhythms and sounds.

The Filipina-American composer, percussionist and sound artist has been living in Berlin with her family for a year now, having been invited to join the DAAD’s Artists-in-Berlin Program as a Music and Sound fellow. She describes her time in Berlin as “a gift”, both for her family and above all for her artistic work. During her residency, Ibarra collaborated with other Artists-in-Berlin fellows on the performance “CHAN: Sonnets and Devotions in the Wilderness”, set in motion an educational project involving German and Ukrainian pupils and worked on “Sky Islands”, a composition about the ecosystem and biodiversity that was awarded the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for Music. What began as an artistic exchange evolved to become a profound connection to the city, its people and the sounds of nature in Berlin.

Ibarra’s compositions are sound maps charting ­rivers, forests and mountains. “Every place has its own language,” she explains. “And I listen.” She ­records the sounds of nature, analyses their ­frequences and translates what she hears into rhythmic cycles, thereby transposing the heartbeat of nature into music.

This is also how her latest work came about: “CHAN: Sonnets and Devotions in the Wilderness” was premiered at the MaerzMusik 2025 festival staged by the Berliner Festspiele. Six movements, six landscapes, in the form of Filipino kundimans – songs of yearning and love. Each kundiman is a sound portrait of a place that holds special significance for Ibarra: a sacred glacial lake in the Himalayan Mountains, the Pasig River in the Philippines or an ancient beech forest in Germany. The compos­ition is accompanied by an ensemble, baroque ­organ and lyrical voices, with Ibarra herself playing percussion. The lyrics of the oratorio were written by South Korean poet Don Mee Choi and Nigerian poet Logan February, likewise fellows on the ­Artists-in-Berlin Program.

The speaker tree sculpture is a particularly impressive feature on Ibarra’s stage. An intricate and specially designed installation that not only looks like a tree but sounds like one, too. Its branches emit gong sounds composed specifically for the purpose, and recorded birdsong from Baltic forests. “I wanted to have an additional musician on stage,” laughs Ibarra. “And what could be more appropriate than a tree?”

Susie Ibarra sees the forest not only as a place, but as one of the performers. “No two trees sound the same, even when they are the same species,” she says, explaining just how much the specific location and surroundings of a tree influence its sound. In her field recordings she captures the subtle frequencies and rhythms that are produced by a tree’s branches, trunks and roots, demonstrating how trees have their very own specific language. “One just has to listen.”

This is one reason why Susie Ibarra didn’t just compose music during her time in Berlin but also initiated an educational project to teach children from the city’s Tegel and Kreuzberg districts how to listen – an important element of ­cultural competence. Equipped with recording equipment and microphones, she took the children with her on a journey of discovery around the former Tegel Airport site: they listened to the sounds made by grass growing, sheep grazing and trees breathing.

“Children have a natural connection to nature and its sounds,” says Ibarra. “We just have to show them how to listen properly.” She was particularly moved by the time she spent with Ukrainian refugee children, by their memories of nature back home, their new experiences in Berlin’s forests and the stories they told her.

It was during a trip to the Philippines that Susie Ibarra began her rather unusual field research. She started recording the music and dances of indi­genous communities, both in the north of the ­island of Luzon, where her family is from, and on the Visayan Islands, Mindanao and Palawan. Indi­genous artists ended up asking her to support them in their fight against environmental destruction such as deforestation and industrial fish ­farming. Ibarra began making field recordings and creating sound portraits of the landscapes under threat. The idea was that her works should show how deeply interwoven humans are with nature – and how essential it is to treat the environment with respect.

Ibarra’s perception of sound as being not only an aesthetic but also ecological phenomenon is a leitmotif that characterises her entire oeuvre. She worked during earlier projects with glaciologists in Canada’s Rocky Mountains, charting sound landscapes of glaciers and river deltas. This led to an interdisciplinary exchange in which musical curiosity and scientific methodology drew inspiration from one another. She is currently working on the materiality of sound. “The way sound travels through ­metal, water or glass isn’t just a question of physics, it’s also poetry,” says Ibarra.

When Susie Ibarra spots the first buds on the horse chestnut tree outside her window she sees them as symbolising her own journey in Berlin: the growth of her artistic ideas in dialogue with nature, the emergence of new sounds and the roots she has put down in her new home.

“I am too a chestnut tree,” writes the poet Don Mee Choi in their joint performance “CHAN” – a line that has come to be a symbol for Susie Ibarra. And an invitation to listen very attentively and perceive the world in an entirely new way. —

Susie Ibarra was a Music and Sound fellow on the DAAD’s Artists-in-Berlin Program from 2024 to 2025. During her residency in Berlin, she produced “CHAN: Sonnets and Devotions in the Wilderness” and the work “Sky Islands”, for which she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Music. Even though her fellowship has ended, the composer, percussionist and sound artist from New York is still living in Berlin.

Learn more about Susie ­Ibarra’s sound art in our ­video portrait.

Opening our ears and minds to nature: the composer Ludger Kisters creates compositions based on the sounds of nature and electroacoustic music – and translates them into visual art. Read our online portrait of the DAAD alumnus and his unusual work.