Tulpa/Doppelgänger

The term tulpa, derived from the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, refers in paranormal discourse to a being that begins as a pure mental construct through intense imagination and then becomes a tangible reality and sensation. Tulpas are created either through a conscious act of individual will or unintentionally from the thoughts of numerous people. David Lynch’s masterpiece Twin Peaks plays with this idea in a fascinating way.
Atmospherically, my work evokes the lingering sense of unease in the third season (2017). Familiar soundscapes open up into the indeterminate; identities seem to shift, at times even taking on their opposites. Musical figures emerge as if from a shadow and dissolve again. Time is stretched, expectation subverted – reality appears as a fragile construction.
In connection with the motif of the doppelgänger, particularly in reference to Edgar Allan Poe, though also familiar in the Christian-Jewish tradition, a field of tension thus arises between projection and reflection, between inner image and outer appearance. The self encounters its own image as an uncanny counterfigure; repetition becomes a threat, reflection a self-interrogation. Nothing returns identical; everything bears a trace of transformation.
Written in memoriam for my friend Uwe Dierksen, who passed away far too early in 2026, the piece gains an additional layer of meaning: memory appears here not as a static remembrance, but as an imaginative act – what is remembered takes shape, the past becomes – for a moment – the present.
Composed for the wonderful Wolfgang Kogert, the work explores the organ as an instrument between body and space, between inner vision and outer resonance. Tulpa/Doppelgänger thus becomes a musical reflection on imagination and identity.

(Johannes Maria Staud, March 16, 2026)