Hoerspiele 1987 by Alfred 23 Harth

Two radio plays by Alfred 23 Harth for the Hessischer Rundfunk, 1987
Instruments, composition and cover art by Alfred 23 Harth.

In 1987, Alfred 23 Harth created a triptych of innovative short radio plays for Hessischer Rundfunk under the collective title Männer, Monde und Maschinenmesser ("Men, Moons, and Machine Knives"). This trilogy consists of Axiom; Daß Sie im All sind, das ist schon merkwürdig—a word collage drawing from texts by Paul Scheerbart, astronaut protocols, and a channeling experiment to the Pleiades; and Boys meet girls, featuring words by Gertrude Stein. These works represent a significant exploration of sound, narrative, and the interplay between human and mechanical agency within the medium of radio art. Produced at a time of vibrant experimentation in German media arts, the plays inhabit a liminal space where distinctions between voice, instrument, and machine dissolve, echoing Harth’s longstanding engagement with the relationships between humans, technology, and language.

The trilogy unfolds as a complex auditory dramaturgy in which male voices interact not only with each other but also with a rich array of mechanical and electronic sounds emblematic of modern technological life. The moon imagery evokes an otherworldly and poetic dimension that contrasts strikingly with the industrial sound environments. Meanwhile, the metaphor of the "machine knife" gestures sharply toward disruption—cutting through conventional linear narratives and symbolic structures.

Harth’s background as an improviser and experimental composer deeply shapes the texture of these plays: they transcend conventional radio drama to become sonic collages where speech rhythms, mechanical noises, and musical gestures interweave. This layering interrogates the coexistence of human creativity and technological processes. His use of abstracted voices and layered soundscapes effectively dissolves familiar boundaries between actor and instrument, word and noise, yielding radio pieces both conceptually rich and aurally adventurous.

Though experimental in form, the plays speak profoundly to contemporary concerns about mediation, communication, and the role of the individual within a technologically mediated society—an ongoing thematic thread throughout Harth’s artistic work. Männer, Monde und Maschinenmesser stands as a vital contribution to late-20th-century German radio art, capturing the uneasy dialogue between man, machine, and poetic imagination at a moment of rapid cultural transformation.

This is the opening of my archive of so far unreleased music. A23H