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Perfume Genius & Kate Wallich 

The Lesson 

Experimental pop superstar Perfume Genius (Mike Hadreas) and choreographer Kate Wallich join forces at the Barbican for the UK premiere of The Lesson - a new live music and dance performance inspired by The Piano Teacher, the notorious novel by Elfriede Jelinek, famously adapted by Michael Heneke.

The Lesson examines what happens when desire has nowhere to go, and what one rehearses when they practise 'good behaviour'. It moves through repression, longing, authority and submission in unstable scenes where roles shift and the unsaid becomes manically physical. Perfume Genius has notably spoken about his love of The Piano Teacher; with its intense, clinical bleakness and its capacity to be both unsettlingly comic and tragic: qualities that echo through The Lesson. 

Following their acclaimed collaboration: The Sun Still Burns Here from 2019, The Lesson sees Hadreas reunite with Wallich alongside his husband and musical partner Alan Wyffels and longtime collaborator Tate Justus. 

At the heart of Hadreas and Wallich’s longstanding creative partnership is the seamless interplay between Wallich’s visceral, ritualistic choreography and the raw physical vulnerability that defines Perfume Genius’s songwriting, turning a traditional concert into an operatic art experience.

“This might be how the music of Perfume Genius is meant to be experienced” — Pitchfork

Produced by the Barbican and Parallel Lines. 

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Unsound London

2k88 + Bianca Scout + Rainy Miller

claire rousay + Martyna Basta

Groundbreaking music festival Unsound and the Barbican present the opening night of Unsound London, taking place in November 2026 under the SOFT POWER theme, following the upcoming Unsound New York edition. 

Unsound’s most expansive London programme in more than a decade, the four-day festival spans five venues, bringing together commissions, premieres, UK debuts and musical left turns from the fringes of the global avant-garde.

The festival opens on Wednesday, November 25 at Milton Court Concert Hall, in an event presented with the Barbican Centre, bringing together two commissioned projects connecting artists from Poland, the UK and US through the Unsound label. Los Angeles-based Canadian composer claire rousay and Polish artist Martyna Basta will perform their debut album hotel room with a cinematic live set featuring visuals by Theresa Baumgartner. They’re followed by a special Poland–UK collaboration between 2K88, Rainy Miller and Bianca Scout, whose debut album Everything Always Changes, for We’re Truly Here also features the voice of Lauren Duffus, threaded throughout the performance. 

The festival is supported by its main partner, the Polish National Foundation. Co-financed by the Minister of Culture and National Heritage from the Culture Promotion Fund.

Produced by the Barbican in association with Unsound

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