PURCHASE $20 TICKETS FOR THURSDAY NIGHT
For LEAF 2026, Ka Baird presents “A thousand miles of hungry static” -a performance piece that explores the spectral forces of reality through various sonic encounters and physical movement.
The piece features extended voice and microphone techniques, live-processed flutes, samples, feedback, fractured rhythms, and interfaces that both trigger and manipulate sound. The performance embodies Ka’s signature tone that is simultaneously confrontational, mysterious, visceral, and humorous.
Artist Bio:
Ka Baird is a performer, sound artist, musician and composer based in New York City. Using extended voice and microphone techniques along with electronics, feedback, field recordings, and traditional instrumentation, they explore the outer dimensions of sound through performance. They create a present tense sound with a vigorous, ritualistic delivery that seeks extreme release through physical exertion and psychic extension. Ka has collaborated with many other artists, both in structured compositions and through their dedicated practice of improvisation.
Their solo releases include “Sapropelic Pycnic” (Drag City 2017), “Respires” (RVNG Intl 2019), “Brooding Exercises” (Longform Editions 2021), and “Vivification Exercises” (RVNG Intl 2021). In March 2024, they released their most recent solo record entitled “Bearings: Soundtracks for the Bardos” through Brooklyn imprint RVNG Intl.
Recent national and international engagements have included performances at Unsound Festival (Krakow, PL), Lampo (Chicago, IL), Museum of Contemporary Art (Chicago, IL), MoMA PS1 (Queens, NY), Issue Project Room (Brooklyn, NY), The Kitchen (NYC), The Institute of Contemporary Art (Philadelphia, PA), TUSK Festival (Newcastle, UK), Incubate (Tilburg, NL), KRAAK (Brussels, BE), Le Guess Who (Utrecht, NL), and the Festival Of Endless Gratitude (Copenhagen, DK). They have been artist-in-residence at We Jazz Festival (Helsinki, FI), Sonoscopia (Porto, PT), Inkonst (Malmo, SE), Experimental Sound Studio (Chicago, IL), and Pioneer Works (Brooklyn, NY). They have been a recipient of the Foundation of Contemporary Art’s Emergency Grant, a Jerome Foundation Artist-In-Residence at Roulette Intermedium, and was a Jerome Hill Artist Fellow through 2023-25.
They are one of the core members of Spires That In The Sunset Rise, founded in Chicago in 2001.
Interview: Ka Baird – Separation, Initiation, and Return