About…me… Sam

Over the Easter holiday I had a think about what sort of material I wanted to use in my second acousmatic composition. Being back at home I felt I should make use of the countryside and the sounds that it has to offer. I went on a really long walk across the South Downs and took some recording gear so I could capture anything along the way which I deemed as interesting. I managed to get some audio clips of some bird song, probably sparrows as there seemed to be loads of them on that day. I also managed to capture alot of sheep sounds. Being lambing season it was hard to find a field where there were no sheep. When I eventually found a good spot there wasn’t a bird to be seen or heard so I gave up with that idea!

Extracting these individual sounds I found somewhat of a challenge. I attempted to use a variety of different EQ plugins to eliminate the undesired sounds but as the audio clips were so densely populated with overlapping frequencies from sheep and birds and other country-like noises it didn’t work very well. After a lot of thought I turned to the opposite sound source and tried thinking of city noises. Being in cambridge I eventually chose upon a bicycle sound and went about recording one.

I managed to get a number of interesting noises out of my housemates bike by putting sticks in the spokes, putting plastic chairs onto the tires as they were being spun to create meaty friction noises. Also just the general mechanics of the bicycles gear system, for example the noise that is made when there is a slight kink in the chain and it catches on the metal, this makes a wonderful noise!

This composition is based around everything from above incorporating both the countryside and bicycle sounds. I initially started arranging them in logic but found that it was easier to manipulate the audio with the elastic time properties in pro tools.

The piece begins with the main gesture which is a bike noise which has been stretched so it starts to distort then plummets down a few octaves. this is heard throughout the entire piece in a variety of different ways. Basically there are 3 sections which are divided up into bicycle sounds, country sounds and then a combination of the two where it reaches the climax of the piece.

I thought I would have a listen to chris watson so listened to two songs from his album called Cima verde. They were the first two songs on the album called Soffi di vento and Cima verde. The first piece is based around the sound of the wind. As well as the wind you can hear another strange sound which reminds me of a noise synth or a slightly less harsh white noise being modulated with a frequency shifter or low pass filter but in a very subtly way. This however could actually just be the sound of whatever the wind is blowing through but I am finding it hard to tell if it is a natural sound or an artificial one.

At the very beginning in the first few seconds as the volume is increasing I initially thought that it was the sound of running water but it was only until I heard what I think is a faint rumble of thunder I visualised it as being wind. This reminded me of Pierre Schaeffer and his theory of reduced listening where by removing the source of the sound and listening to its own unique sound signature without adding images or visualisation. The beginning section reminded me especially of VOX 5 by Trevor Wishart.

The second piece I listened to was the album titled track, Cima verde. This again starts off with a deep rumble which sounds like a sort of wind. Soon after a chime like noise is heard faintly over the roar of the wind. A sound which at first sounds like frogs gradually moulds itself into the sound of a raven or another similar bird. The fact that this wind-like sound continues throughout the entire piece it is still so interesting to listen to as it is constantly changing in volume, attack and even the timbre changes in some sections. The bird calls sound as they are quite close to the listener within the stereo field and towards the right slightly. I like this second piece becuase even though I was listening to it stereo it gives the image of being in a very spacious environment. I have a very clear image in my head of where I am. I see that I am in the middle of a barren wasteland maybe some sort of marsh or bog on a cold grey autumn day where there is little signs of life.

I haven’t listened to anymore of this album but will inevitable want to listen to the rest after hearing the first two tracks.

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Everyone seems to be listening to Chris Watson recently so I decided to listen to David Lynch instead. The particular piece I listened to was the the opening scene from his film called Eraserhead. This is a surrealistic film from the mid 1970′s. It is both written and directed by Lynch.

The opening scene starts with a chord on a guitar with a basic drum beat which misses out some beats here and there. There is no real melody just a series of different rhythms played on the guitar which is accompanied by a bass guitar in certain parts.

When the worm starts emerging from the mans mouth you can hear some analog sounds which I think I can replicate on a guitar delay pedal. By increasing the feedback time and gradually decreasing the delay you can manipulate the sound to create a similar noise. It appears that Lynch like to use a lot of guitar effects when performing and recording this work.

The entire opening piece has a calm and tranquil feel to it if you were just to listen to the music but the video shows some odd and frankly quite disturbing images of worms coming out of peoples mouths and a masked man pulling leavers. About 5 minutes into the piece the music changes feel again and Lynch introduces strings which play a bass line which is accompanied by an acoustic guitar.

I have only seen the first half of the film but I would recommend watching it if you have some spare time. It is very weird to say the least but I am enjoying it so far.

This is a link to the first part of Eraserhead:
Eraserhead – Opening scene

The Second David Lynch production I watched/listened to was call Rabbits. This is a selection of short films where 3 characters are dressed up as rabbits. I have only listened to the first two episodes but the music is very atmospheric. He uses sound clips of a storm, thunder and lightening. There is a synth that is being played under the entire performance and adds surges of noise to create dramatic points. The characters exchange some strange conversations that don’t make sense half the time. During some of these there are sounds clips of people bursting out laughing and applauding. At first I thought that the laughing was actually by the people watching the performance but I soon realised that that was part of the music. Again like Eraserhead it is a very strange work but I am intrigued to how the use of only a few sounds can create such a diverse range of moods.

Here are the links for the first two episodes:

Rabbits – Episode 1
Rabbits – Episode 2

I have chosen to do this 1 minute composition in protools 8 because I could make the most of the elastic time feature. Here it is divided into 4 properties; Polyphonic, Monophonic, Rhythmic and varispeed. I have tried to used all properties in my piece. I first decided on working with a shorter sound excerpt but after a few attempts I felt like a more interesting sound which had greater density and texture. I narrowed it down and finally decided on the sound of a toilet flushing which I proceeded to record. I tried to go for a more spacial sound rather than a very busy sounding piece like some of other peoples compositions I heard today in the seminar.

I started by using the polyphonic property on the entire sound and stretched it for the whole minute. I did this because I wanted a low drone sound that continued throughout the piece. I then started to introduce short loud sounds which cut across the drone. I varied the delay effect on each interjection of sound so some of them were very wet and others more dry. I tried to get a large pitch range out of the toilet. By using the other elastic properties it found it easy to manipulate the sounds to what I wanted.

There is no silence in the piece, instead I wanted the drone to go on which I thought could represent silence. This is a slightly odd concept that I decided to use but at first I wasn’t sure if it would work. I think its been quite effective and I like the way it works on the four large speakers in the room.

I spent a lot of my time working on how the sounds grow out from one another later on in the piece. Sometime you hear the decay from the sound where I have dismissed the attack. Some of the sounds sound like they have been looped and are quite rhythmic. This was created by using the rhythmic property which doesn’t change the pitch of the sound but stretches the overall time it takes to play it (hence rhythmic property). I used crossfades on one sound which created a short rhythmic burst of noise but I am still unsure how it even managed to do that!

I wanted to compose this piece so people would be unsure of what the source sound was. In parts of the piece I quietly played the original sound under all of the main parts towards the end. This was an idea that came from a conversation I had about subliminal advertising/messages in a TV programme and applied this to my piece. Today when I performed the composition people were surprised that it was a toilet flushing, I think I have achieved what I set out to do using this method.

I am pleased with this and will hope to use and expand it in my 4 minute piece which will be only the same lines as this but maybe introducing a different sound to vary the timbre in the piece.

Today  I listened again to Theme De La Fuite by Francis Dhomont. This piece is supposed to be about flight. It is clear to hear some distinct sounds of aeroplanes and rockets taking off. Also this piece contains an extract from a piece by Schubert.

Also heard a piece by Normandeau called Malina, from Clair Du Terre. A japanese instrument called a shakuhachi is the main sound that is used and transformed. This piece is meant to sounds like being in space which it achieves very well by using different textures and techniques. For example I like the underlying drones with breathy noises over the top creating more of a rhythmic device than a harmonic addition to the section of the piece.

I’ve had some more thoughts on my own composition. If I can gather sounds of each instruments from an orchestra I would like to replicate the orchestra tuning up before a concert. Another Idea I had was to go along the lines of animal calls. So many choices I can’t decide.

Denis Smalley’s wind chimes is pretty much what it says. I like the combination of the metal chimes and wooden chimes.

The mixture of the actual sound of the chime mixed with effects and different techniques, for example reversing the sound, creates some unusual noises, sometimes making you have to think twice a re listen to it because it can pass you by without you knowing. Some of them are very subtle but done effectively.

I get the impression that the piece has a large stereo image. At 5’40” there is a similar sound to aphex twin Bucephalus Bouncing Ball also here is a good example of spacial awareness as the sound moves around.

At 53” it is almost like a fly the way that the sounds have been sped up and looped over a short period of time. Its a very relaxing piece, gives me the feeling of water
moving down a stream in China or some other Asian country. Unlike some of Smalley’s other compositions he uses silence very effectively in Wind Chimes allowing the sounds to grow out of nowhere and come through the texture.

This is one of my favorite pieces by Smalley.

My housemate wrote a poem for me. I recorded him reciting it and then cut it up into words, I then proceeded to break down the words into syllables. I will now try taking all the different sounds that make up the speech line and replicate different words by putting the necessary sounds together. I am still doubtful that this will work but we shall see after I have finished gathering all of of them as I am still short of a few.

Today went out onto the streets of cambridge to record city sounds. Also recorded people making noises eg laughter, general talking. Trying to find something else to do with them.