Open Ears Festival

We are so excited to present to you Open Ears Festival 2026! #OE26 brings a transformative sonic experience to the Kitchener-Waterloo region, designed for curious ears! Join us from June 4-June 7 for performances and workshops featuring this incredible lineup of musicians: 👂Thursday, June 4: 6PM - Interactive Performance Workshop with @Duo_Cichorium at @cogskitchener 8PM - @thehappenstancers Future Pastorale at @registrytheatre 👂Friday, June 5: 6PM - DIY Instruments and Noisemakers Workshop with @Duo_Cichorium at @cogskitchener 7:30PM - @frankhorvatofficial and Joann Whang Confined in Everyday Scenes at @kitchenerlibrary Theatre 9PM - @ANIMA_earlymusic & the Open Ears Festival co-present the world premiere of Mme Caeneus’s Canteen at @registrytheatre 👂Saturday, June 6: 11AM - Found Sound Ensemble’s Serene Music at Victoria Park Lake 1PM - @labyrinthontario ’s Fragmented Forms at @trilliumlutheran 3PM - @leslie.a.ting What Brings You In presented by OE Patron Mohan Thomas at @perimeterinstitute 5PM - @kira_arts_aly_keita Nimba: the performative installation at Waterloo City Hall 6PM - Improv Workshop with @Duo_Cichorium at @cogskitchener 8PM - @kairos_perc_quartet at @registrytheatre 👂Sunday, June 7: 1PM - @Duo_Cichorium The Sylvan Legacy at @registrytheatre 3PM - @taktusduo and @torqpercussion Canto Ostinato at Kitchener City Hall Rotunda 👂 Duration of the festival: Hours. Minutes. Seconds. by Peter Hatch at @kwartgallery Festival passes and this year’s line-up are now available at openears.ca 💻 See you next month!

🎭Introducing the WORLD PREMIERE of Mme Caeneus’s Canteen, co-presented by @ANIMA_earlymusic and @openearsfest 🎭 ⏰ June 5 @ 9 pm 📍@registrytheatre (122 Frederick St.) 💵$30/$5 student with ID A transy chamber opera set in the queer world of Mme Caeneus’s, a ‘locker club’ in WWII America, where host/ess Lucy (‘Mme Caeneus’) holds space for transformation in the midst of a polarized world. Madame Caeneus’s Canteen! A beggar can become a queen, a queen become a corporal, the corporal can trade his stripes for civvies of a Friday night — … Two intersecting gender transitions unfold against the backdrop of the sexual, gender, and racial politics of the 1940s U.S. — and beyond that, against the backdrop of the bronze-age transition story which a group of soldiers are acting out in their ‘blueprint special’ drag revue. A story of queer solidarity, love, and chosen family, this opera resonates in and for our own time. 👗👔👑 This performance is part of Open Ears Festival 2026, which takes place June 4-7, 2026. This experimental sound festival brings a transformative sonic experience to the Kitchener-Waterloo region, designed for curious ears! Go to www.openears.ca to view the full festival schedule and purchase your festival pass.

🎼 Confined in Everyday Scenes (@frankhorvatofficial and Joann Whang) ⏰ June 5 @ 7:30 pm 📍@kitchenerlibrary Theatre at 85 Queen St N 💵$30/$5 student with ID At the heart of this concert is the world premiere of Confined in Everyday Scenes, a new suite for solo cello and fixed electronics by composer Frank Horvat, commissioned by acclaimed cellist Joann Whang. This powerful work invites audiences into a profound musical journey that exposes the uneasy coexistence of the ordinary and the unseen—where familiar, everyday moments can conceal hidden realities of modern-day slavery and exploitation. Horvat and Whang began imagining this collaboration in 2021, grounded in a shared desire to create music that bears witness and sparks conversation. Inspired by Laura T. Murphy’s book Survivors of Slavery: Modern-Day Slave Narratives, the project broadened into a deeper exploration of contemporary slavery worldwide. With Murphy’s guidance, and through ongoing conversations with NGOs working on the front lines to help people leave lives of enslavement, this premiere aims to amplify survivor voices and illuminate what too often goes unrecognized. Surrounding the premiere are additional works by contemporary composers championed by Whang. Together, these pieces offer a space to listen deeply—and to see more clearly. 🌐🎻☎️ This performance is part of Open Ears Festival 2026, which takes place June 4-7, 2026. This experimental sound festival brings a transformative sonic experience to the Kitchener-Waterloo region, designed for curious ears! Go to www.openears.ca to view the full festival schedule and purchase your festival pass.

🚂 DIY Instruments and Noisemakers Workshop with @Duo_Cichorium ⏰ June 5 @ 6 pm 📍 Church of Good Shepherd @cogskitchener at 116 Queen St N 💵FREE! In this instrument building workshop, Duo Cichorium will guide attendees through the development of DIY instruments commonly used in their musical practice. This includes the (possible) creation of music box scrolls, windchimes, rattlers, and noise boxes. The instruments created will be recession-friendly as all materials are sourced from either the dollar store or your own personal junk drawer. Attendees are encouraged to bring a small collection of junk (cutlery, old keys, gamepieces) and will leave the workshop with a DIY noisemaker of some sort. 🗝️♟️🔔 This performance is part of Open Ears Festival 2026, which takes place June 4-7, 2026. This experimental sound festival brings a transformative sonic experience to the Kitchener-Waterloo region, designed for curious ears! Go to www.openears.ca to view the full festival schedule and purchase your festival pass.

🔮Future Pastorale @thehappenstancers ⏰ June 4 @ 8 pm 📍The Registry Theatre @registrytheatre (122 Frederick St.) 💵$30/$5 student with ID In FUTURE PASTORALE, three performers create a path connecting the past and future. Using Claude Vivier’s rarely-performed and enigmatic Ojikawa as a foundation, the artists construct an evening of collaboratively composed/improvised acoustic and electronic performances that explore the imagined pastoral expanses of antiquity and link them to the endless digital landscapes of tomorrow. This work features poems from William Blake’s Songs of Innocence as well as text manipulations and generative poetry created by the performers with tools utilizing artificial intelligence. Taking inspiration from the Knee Plays of Philip Glass’ Einstein on the Beach, these texts are then fragmented and layered. Framing Vivier’s work with spoken-word recitations and collaboratively composed works by Cherwin, Pino, and Young, FUTURE PASTORALE challenges the expectations of Vivier’s forward-thinking and experimental trio. Recasting Vivier’s work as nostalgic and historical — in a subtle upending of the expected understanding of Ojikawa as contemporary — FUTURE PASTORALE envisions expansive new possibilities for the chamber music recital, blending abstract narrative, improvisation, spoken word poetry, collaborative composition, and theatrical lighting to evoke a future that is equal parts celestial and computerized. 💻🖼️🎼 This performance is part of Open Ears Festival 2026, which takes place June 4-7, 2026. This experimental sound festival brings a transformative sonic experience to the Kitchener-Waterloo region, designed for curious ears! Go to www.openears.ca to view the full festival schedule and purchase your festival pass.

🪄 Interactive Performance Workshop with @Duo_Cichorium ⏰ June 4 @ 6 pm 📍 Church of Good Shepherd @cogskitchener at 116 Queen St N 💵FREE! In this interactive performance, audience members will be able to participate in two of our interactive projects, Canvas Conductor and Speed Run. The sound generated for both works is reliant on gesture; the former utilizing the action of painting, and the latter on the action of gaming — specifically Super Smash Bros. on the Nintendo GameCube. Following each “performance” will be a discussion period to share details on the technology and development of these works 💾🕹️🎮 This workshop is part of Open Ears Festival 2026, which takes place June 4-7, 2026. This experimental sound festival brings a transformative sonic experience to the Kitchener-Waterloo region, designed for curious ears! Go to www.openears.ca to view the full festival schedule and purchase your festival pass.

⏳Hours. Minutes. Seconds. by Peter Hatch ⏰ June 4-7 📍 Kitchener Waterloo Art Gallery @kwartgallery at 101 Queen St N 💵FREE! West Coast Radians, loudspeakers, recycled iPads, bark, leaves, cardboard. Hours. Minutes. Seconds. is an audiovisual installation that explores our cultural habit of measuring and counting time. Visitors are invited to step inside what feels like the interior of an unconventional clock mechanism, where ticks, tocks, and other time-related sounds surround and shift as they move through the space. As a composer, I work as a kind of ‘time sculptor’, negotiating the different experiences of time I feel when planning a work while understanding how different the time sense will likely feel by those experiencing the work. All of this is measured against ‘clock time’, often in the form of musical bars and rhythms. Hours. Minutes. Seconds. creates a space in which visitors can sense the relativity of time while remaining aware of clock time as something precisely measured and regulated. The installation’s soundscape draws inspiration from the natural world, where multiple sound sources coexist in counterpoint. Each occupies its own sonic space, defined by frequency range and varying levels of activity and density. The sounds combine synthetic elements with recordings from natural environments. This soundscape is accompanied by a series of handmade clocks constructed from natural materials—such as bark, leaves, and cardboard—using commercial clock mechanisms alongside digital devices. The digital elements are programmed in Max/MSP. 🍃🎛️🌲 Hours. Minutes. Seconds. is part of Open Ears Festival 2026, which takes place June 4-7, 2026. This experimental sound festival brings a transformative sonic experience to the Kitchener-Waterloo region, designed for curious ears! Go to www.openears.ca to view the full festival schedule and purchase your festival pass.

❤️Thank you @musicworksmag for the festival feature! With only one month to go, we’re gearing up for this packed weekend of percussion + world premieres + local talent + more! Save the date for our experimental and transformative sound festival: 📆June 4-7, 2026 📍Various venues around the Kitchener-Waterloo region 💵7 FREE shows, installations + workshops ➡️$35/$5 student pricing for ticketed shows ➡️$152 festival pass!

Introducing Day 4 of #OE26 Open Ears 2026 concludes on Sunday, June 7th! The final day of our festival includes a video-game inspired participatory performance, and a celebration of one of the most quietly radical works of late-20th-century minimalism. This is also your last chance to check out our festival-long time sculpture! ⏳Hours. Minutes. Seconds. by Peter Hatch ⏰ On for the duration of the festival! 📍 Kitchener Waterloo Art Gallery @kwartgallery at 101 Queen St N 💵FREE! 🐱 The Sylvan Legacy by @Duo_Cichorium ⏰ 1 pm 📍The Registry Theatre @registrytheatre (122 Frederick St.) 💵$30/$5 student with ID 🎹 Canto Ostinato featuring @taktusduo and @torqpercussion ⏰ 3 pm 📍 Kitchener City Hall Rotunda (200 King St W) 💵 FREE! These events are part of Open Ears Festival 2026, which takes place June 4-7, 2026. This experimental sound festival brings a transformative sonic experience to the Kitchener-Waterloo region, designed for curious ears! Go to www.openears.ca to view the full festival schedule and purchase your festival pass.

Introducing Day 3 of #OE26 Open Ears 2026 continues on Saturday, June 6th! This busy day of programming includes multiple takes on microtonality, a therapeutic exploration of music, living heritage installations, all-level improv workshop and unconventional percussion techniques! + don’t forget to check out the festival-long time sculpture! ⏳Hours. Minutes. Seconds. by Peter Hatch ⏰ On for the duration of the festival! 📍 Kitchener Waterloo Art Gallery @kwartgallery at 101 Queen St N 💵FREE! 🥣Serene Music by Found Sound Ensemble ⏰ 11 am 📍Victoria Park Lake at David St 💵 FREE! 🏰 @labyrinthontario ’s Fragmented Forms ⏰ 1 pm 📍 @trilliumlutheran at 22 Willow St 💵$30/$5 student with ID 🎻 @leslie.a.ting What Brings You In ⏰ 3 pm 📍 @perimeterinstitute at 31 Caroline St N 💵$30/$5 student with ID 🤸🏿‍♂️ @kira_arts_aly_keita Nimba: the performative installation ⏰ 5 pm 📍 Waterloo City Hall 💵 FREE! 🫀 Improv Workshop with @Duo_Cichorium ⏰ 6 pm 📍 Church of Good Shepherd @cogskitchener at 116 Queen St N 💵FREE! 🥁Twisted Ritual @kairos_perc_quartet ⏰ 8 pm 📍The Registry Theatre @registrytheatre (122 Frederick St.) 💵$30/$5 student with ID These events are part of Open Ears Festival 2026, which takes place June 4-7, 2026. This experimental sound festival brings a transformative sonic experience to the Kitchener-Waterloo region, designed for curious ears! Go to www.openears.ca to view the full festival schedule and purchase your festival pass.

Introducing Day 2 of #OE26 The festival continues on Friday, June 5th! Join us for an instrument building workshop(BYO junk), followed by TWO world premieres: suite for solo cello and fixed electronics, then a transy chamber opera set in WWII. + don’t forget to check out the festival-long time sculpture! ⏳Hours. Minutes. Seconds. by Peter Hatch ⏰ On for the duration of the festival! 📍 Kitchener Waterloo Art Gallery @kwartgallery at 101 Queen St N 💵FREE! 🚂 DIY Instruments and Noisemakers Workshop with @Duo_Cichorium ⏰ 6 pm 📍 Church of Good Shepherd @cogskitchener at 116 Queen St N 💵FREE! 🎼 Confined in Everyday Scenes (@frankhorvatofficial and Joann Whang) ⏰ 7:30 pm 📍@kitchenerlibrary Theatre at 85 Queen St N 💵$30/$5 student with ID 🎭Mme Caeneus’s Canteen @ANIMA_earlymusic ⏰ 9 pm 📍@registrytheatre (122 Frederick St.) 💵$30/$5 student with ID These events are part of Open Ears Festival 2026, which takes place June 4-7, 2026. This experimental sound festival brings a transformative sonic experience to the Kitchener-Waterloo region, designed for curious ears! Go to www.openears.ca to view the full festival schedule and purchase your festival pass.

Introducing Day 1 of #OE26 The festival kicks off on Thursday, June 4th! Join us for an interactive performance workshop and discussion utilizing technology, followed by an evening of collaboratively composed/improvised electro-acoustic works. PLUS, a festival-long time sculpture! ⏳Hours. Minutes. Seconds. by Peter Hatch ⏰ On for the duration of the festival! 📍 Kitchener Waterloo Art Gallery @kwartgallery at 101 Queen St N 💵FREE! 🪄 Interactive Performance Workshop with @Duo_Cichorium ⏰ 6 pm 📍 Church of Good Shepherd @cogskitchener at 116 Queen St N 💵FREE! 🔮Future Pastorale @thehappenstancers ⏰ 8 pm 📍The Registry Theatre @registrytheatre (122 Frederick St.) 💵$30/$5 student with ID These events are part of Open Ears Festival 2026, which takes place June 4-7, 2026. This experimental sound festival brings a transformative sonic experience to the Kitchener-Waterloo region, designed for curious ears! Go to www.openears.ca to view the full festival schedule and purchase your festival pass.