Ciaran Morahan - Music for and inspired by CHORA (2026)

“CHORA” (from the Ancient Greek χώρα – meaning “space,” but also a generative emptiness, a womb-like ground of origin) is rooted in the idea that emptiness is not absence, but beginning. It is a space that exists before form – a living container, a fertile silence from which everything emerges.

UK composer Ciaran Morahan (lead member of post-rock group Codes in the Clouds) has announced the release of CHORA, his original score for choreographer Sofia Nappi and her acclaimed contemporary dance company KOMOCO’s new performance with the same name. The full score will see its release on October 30.

For the album, the composer has written a 55-minute score that responds to the performance’s exploration of breath, gravity, rhythm and connection. Built from electronic textures, ever-evolving pulses and shifting sonic landscapes, the music moves between intimacy and expansiveness, allowing sound to occupy the spaces between movement and stillness.

The score originated from Morahan’s idea of listening: to the body, to silence, to the spaces we occupy and to the forces that continually act upon us. From listening to the sounds around you, wherever you may be, rhythms emerge.

"None of the choreography had actually been created when I began composing the music," says Morahan. "I was working without the usual visual reference points – just a sense that the music needed to hit a certain intensity, or arrive at a specific moment. The challenge was turning that into a score with its own identity, one that could still find its way to the choreography."

As the choreography evolves, so too does the music – moving from intimate and fragile passages towards wide expansive moments. What initially appears empty gradually reveals itself as charged with energy and possibility.

It is through this dialogue between sound and movement, Sofia Nappi’s CHORA – The Void Of Origin asks us to reconsider emptiness: not as something missing, but as a space alive, full of potential.

CHORA is a musical journey in which sound, movement and space become inseparable. "I've always been drawn to music that can balance something fragile and atmospheric with sounds that are much more abrasive, physical and industrial," says Morahan, citing Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross and HEALTH as touchstones for the score.

Adding about their collaboration, Nappi says “Creating the music of CHORA with Ciaran Morahan was a process built on trust. Our conversation was clear and instinctive, and the moment Ciaran could witness the movement taking shape, the flow of the creation seemed almost unspokenly clear to him. In a way, our collaboration reflected CHORA itself: something you can perceive without needing to fully grasp or define. Together we searched for a sound that felt deeply human and timeless - primordial and organic, yet carrying contemporary and futuristic elements.”