Hjärtebarnsfonden
Heartbeat Drum Machine
A working drum machine built from the real heartbeats of four children with congenital heart disease, made with audio-visual artist Love Hultén and teenage engineering to raise awareness and donations for the Swedish Heartchild Foundation.
Challenge
When a child is born with congenital heart disease, the rhythm of life is disrupted. Hjärtebarnsfonden (the Swedish Heartchild Foundation) is a small nonprofit funding vital research and supporting the children and families affected. Our challenge was to bring greater attention to their work and make a complex, often invisible condition impossible to ignore.
Solution
Together with audio-visual artist Love Hultén and teenage engineering, we created CHD-4 — a drum machine built around the irregular rhythms of congenital heart disease. Its sounds were sampled from the real heartbeats of four children, Liv, Janiyah, Wega and Vincent, each living with a different heart defect, selected together with a leading Swedish cardiologist to represent the diversity of the condition. By turning heartbeats into beats, CHD-4 transformed something usually heard only through a stethoscope into music that could be heard, played and shared.
Results
CHD-4 was unveiled during Way Out West, bringing the children’s heartbeats to a new audience through music. The instrument was later used by several artists in dedicated jam sessions, and the project travelled beyond its initial launch and gained global media coverage. Finally, CHD-4 was auctioned off, with the proceeds donated to Hjärtebarnsfonden, turning attention into direct support for children with congenital heart disease and their families.
