#21

Imho sometimes a document of a place is best a document of a place, and the work with the document is maybe better when you let the snapshot of the place be the snapshot of the place and not try too much to make it a certain sound? Microphone recording of the “grain of the acoustic field” as Kim Cascone has put it is like photography in its biased beginnings: the framing of the material aspects of the recording becomes the manifestation of the recording as a sound object that goes on to make a kind of a fingerprinted portrait of a space… um so I really think for a project like this even if you’re super hands-off in your curatorial approach there is going to be a rich world to tap into… and also the coloration of whatever fidelity and properties of the recording equipment is just another flavor of the color present in every recording.

I guess I’m saying that pre-selecting for musical features in recordings like this is understandable but imho somehow limiting of the pregnant nature of the photograph-like framing of a moment? Omg I’m sounding like a damn hippy.

4 Likes
#22

Uploaded my track. Minor cheating in that I’ve edited together a couple of recordings from the same morning to give a bit more variety in the material. If that’s flouting the rules too much let me know and I can upload just one of the recordings.

2 Likes
#23

Dropped in one of each from my collection :wink:

2 Likes
#24

I managed to get a couple of slightly better (but still phone-based) recordings. I’ve deleted my old files, uploaded the new recordings, and changed the spreadsheet (because I have now submitted one day and one night recording, rather than two day recordings). Sorry for the late change!!

1 Like
#25

Thanks, @alanza, @Jet, and @dailybells for the feedback; very helpful. In the end, I selected what I found most enchanting: the delicious morning cacophony of my mother’s former back yard. :owl::bird:

3 Likes
#26

Tangent on field recording: I attended a panel talk featuring Nicolas Bernier and Richard Chartier here in New Zealand and they caused a bit of a rumble saying they turn their noses up at bird noises.

Putting aside a certain lineage in New Zealand academic composition*, it’s just unavoidable when recording outdoors here! :bird:

(* Mulling over what a New Zealand music could be, the first composer to establish an electronic music studio decided the unique audio environment was the touch point composers should work from. And we’re islands of birds - of all of the native fauna, the only land mammals are a couple of species of bats - so that audio environment is all about birdlife. )

4 Likes
#27

uploading my recording now, excited to finally participate in one of these :slight_smile:

3 Likes
#28

ouch, for some reason i thought the deadline for sounds was Feb. 28th.
I’ll see if i can take a moment to go out there this evening, otherwise i’ll dig into my files and will try to make it before midnight IDLW :smiley:

#29

I’ve been thinking more about this. I got the initial (I assume intended) chuckle at the ludicrousness of poo-pooing bird sounds in NZ, but after thinking further, it seems actually understandable: culturally, local phenomena are often invalidated simply because, locally, they are everyday things for the people who live near them, even if they are exotic or precious for those who don’t. The part of the US I live in now is very wet and people constantly complain about the rain, but in the desert where I grew up, rain was celebrated for its rarity; conversely, sunny days are precious here, but ho-hum there. So it goes…

3 Likes
#30

and will try to make it before midnight IDLW :smiley:

don’t stress about it, I have a show tonight–will probably be getting around to checking tomorrow evening (5-ish EST)

2 Likes
#31

Managed to get my recordings uploaded. Pretty high noise floor on the night time one, sorry about that. It was just a relatively quiet night! Pretty sure I could de-ess it if necessary though.

3 Likes
#32

Both of mine have a high noise floor too. The Cafe one is I hope interestingly poor quality all around, since I intentionally recorded it with a handheld voice recorder.

4 Likes
#33

I haven’t written my name down on the sheet yet, but I’m planning to join in. Listening through a series of recent field recordings outside my door right now, and I’m very torn. I don’t have time to do 5 or 6 tracks in the end, though, I suppose. :wink:

#34

Listening through those ended up being strangely emotional. There’s been a lot happening around the neighborhood lately, some captured in the recordings. Most recently, a flash flood emergency filled Saturday night with sounds of torrents, heavy truck engines, and sirens (thankfully, no one was hurt). I think I’ll choose a more serene scene from gentle nighttime rains earlier in the month for upload, though.

2 Likes
#35

@bellyfullofstars found an issue with the google drive folder mentioning it was full. Not sure exactly what’s up there but if anyone runs into it, just send me a link where I can download the sample and I’ll make sure it gets included.

Sorry about the inconvenience,
John

1 Like
#36

Yeah to be honest they were just pointing out a bit of an aural cliche, same as probably rain storms, whale song, etc. And fair enough! Bernier is a lecturer, so more power to him trying to get his students to at least pay attention to try and do something new.

But yeah it was funny. Not least because in the concert that followed a local composer did a piece that was basically a recording of him jamming with birds.

2 Likes
#37

Also I hope we don’t all get stressed about the quality of our recordings! I had a moment as I’m certainly no recording engineer and usually work itb.

But, kind of echoing @dailybells above, high noise floor, phone mics, scuffing etc… All this stuff is just fodder for fun musical decisions imo.

6 Likes
#38

just checked all the files in the drive–everything works!

reached out to one person who signed up but hadn’t put a file in yet, otherwise the spreadsheet and drive folder line up.

10 Likes
#39

Here are the pairings!

16%20PM
Screen Shot 2019-03-01 at 12.36.16 PM.png570×584 63.3 KB

The next step is to download from the drive the person to the right of you on this spreadsheet’s sample (make sure you use the correct sample, some people have uploaded both day and night samples), and then use the sample you uploaded and theirs to create a piece of music.

You can upload the track you create to the same drive folder (and if you have any trouble, just message me). It is due March 28th.

Very excited to see what people make! I skimmed the samples to make sure they worked and there is some really interesting stuff here!

11 Likes
#40

This is great. Thanks so much for making this happen.

5 Likes