Sara Lehad is an Algerian sound artist, musician and researcher based in Paris. Her practice combines improvisation, synthesis and live performance, with no input mixing as one of her central techniques. The mixing desk becomes a self generating sound source, with feedback processed through effects and granular voice manipulation. Physical gesture, attentive listening, tension, distortion and moments of sonic rupture play an important role in her work.

Lehad graduated in electroacoustic music from the Conservatoire de Pantin and is currently completing a practice based PhD at Université Paris 8. Her research focuses on “amplified silence”, the background noise generated by the mixer, which she approaches as a metaphor for postcolonial silencing in the Algerian French context. She has performed at venues and festivals including Les Instants Chavirés in Montreuil, LUFF in Lausanne and Jauna Musika in Vilnius.