Feeling for Sound- Further Research

Stephen Vitiello-

Stephen Vitiello is an electronic musician and sound artist who creates soundscapes that change audience perceptions of spaces. In an interview with him, he says that he mostly makes work for gallery exhibitions, but it has most recently gone towards public spaces, and his work consists of how he listens to the world. In what is probably his most famous piece, which was conducted during his residency in the World Trade Centre in 1999, he recorded the sounds of the building after a hurricane and played the sound inside the building, so it sounded like a creaky ship moving.

Another piece which encompasses this idea is 'A Bell for Every Minute' which was produced a year later. This is recording 52 of New York City's bells and playing the hit of one every minute, but playing them on top of each other. This creates the initial hitting noise of the bell, then layers upon layers of vibrating and ringing as if you were inside the bells themselves. You can listen to that piece here: http://www.moma.org/interactives/exhibitions/2013/soundings/artists/13/works/

In terms of his more musical work, on the electronic musician side of him, he works closely with other musicians or sound artists to create albums that overall seem to have a general theme, usually decided by the kind of instruments used. What I gathered about these works is that they are not heavily concept driven through each individual album, but in general Vitiello tries to explore the use of instruments in creating sound, and what sounds you can create with these instruments. I focused in particular on one of the albums 'Between You and the Shapes You Take' which collaborated with musician Molly Berg.

Between You And The Shapes You Take is the second collaborative album by Richmond based musician/sound artists Stephen Vitiello and Molly Berg. As with the duo’s previous release, The Gorilla Variations (12k2013, 2009), tracks are created out of improvisations and sculpted through editing. Molly Berg’s clarinet and vocalizations tend to cover the CD’s lyrical content while Vitiello’s guitar and processing covers a good deal of the textures.

http://www.12k.com/index.php/site/releases/between_you_and_the_shapes_you_take/

This album was described on the web page linked above as 'melancholic' in ways, which is why I chose to focus on it. The memories in my project at times will aim to produce melancholy and I can really see what is meant when describing this album. Berg's instrumental sounds in tracks such as 'Recap (with violin)' which features a violin or 'Clarinet Assembly' which features a Clarinet, have long notes which make up a simple improvised melody. Along with Vitiello's textures added, which especially in Clarinet Assembly, created depth in the piece. I found it quite easy to get lost in the sounds of this album, and I can see how it would trigger memories and a sense of melancholy for people.

You can listen to most of his work on Spotify, but you can listen to 'Recap (With Violin)' and 'Clarinet Assembly' below:

Feeling for Sound- Further Research

Cathy Lane-

Cathy Lane is a composer, sound artist, lecturer and researcher. Her work and research has taken an interest in the past, and individual memories through sound, which in turn led to an exploration of gender, spoken word, anthropology in sound design. Her work consists of field recordings, site specific installations, concert pieces, installed compositions etc.

On her soundcloud page 'playing with words': https://soundcloud.com/playingwithwords there are extracts of many of her works. The first one I was interested in looking at was 'Nesting Stones' as when initially researching about Cathy Lane, that piece came up a lot and The Wire listed it under their '100 Records That Set the World On Fire While No One Was Listening' list.

This is from the description of the piece on Sound Cloud:

Anybody who has ever had an intense relationship with another person will know that for every positive emotion experienced there is a corresponding negative feeling. Nesting Stones is based on my feelings about my relationship with my baby daughter.
In this composition I am using and developing anecdotal structures and gestural metaphors harnessing the sense of spatial positioning and movement and the tension between the recognisable and stated and the barely recognisable and unrecognisable to explore and express the contradictions and dualities of that relationship.
The sound material for the piece is all drawn from recordings of myself and my daughter.

This piece, for me, is successful in the sense that it shows the peaks and troughs in a relationship, with moments of longer, more hypnotic sounds and moments of loud, quick chaos. However, like a relationship, it is never silent. There is always movement, it is persistent. It reminds me of what people must experience when becoming a new parent. The uncertainty, anxiety, and chaotic nature of the relationship as you get no break from this child who constantly needs your attention.

In terms of the actual sound design technique, I really love the electro acoustic feel to this. With the combination of field recordings and the heavy manipulation, Lane has given the child's voice less of an organic, living quality and more of a relentless, parasitic one. However, for my own sound design, I think this would lack some kind of consistency, however I really love the electro acoustic thing she has done and I would love to incorporate some elements of this in my own project.




Hidden Lives was another popular piece I discovered, its popularity unsurprising to me as it tackles gender roles for women in the past. What this piece was trying to create was a sense of memory associated with a space where women were subjected to a life of backbreaking house upkeep, including the upkeep of their own appearance as well. This is discussed in the description given of this piece:

All the material for this piece is drawn from a selection of women reading from “The Book of Hints and Wrinkles” a small piece of social history from the 1930s which describes how women should manage both their houses and themselves in no uncertain terms. The daily routine timetable is enough to ensure that no woman could ever spend much time outside the house or away from this backbreaking schedule, and advice on personal appearance is delivered in such a way as to suggest that women are in fact part of the furnishing of the house to be polished, scrubbed and generally to look clean, welcoming and attractive.

Where this piece succeeds for me mostly is the spoken word elements of the piece, with only words or sounds being heard in an echoed fashion. The layering of these voices also provides a sense of the period of time this was happening in, and the sheer volume of people that were being subjected to this kind of life. Also the constant noise underneath this piece, especially in the beginning gives a sense of the constant work that women in the 1930's were undertaking, and that was expected of them.



The last project I was interested in looking into was The Memory Machine, which relates very directly to my own project. The memory machine was a site specific interactive sound installation which was trying to trigger individual memories for people.

The Memory Machine was an interactive installation which was developed in collaboration with Nye Parry. It had two different manifestations in 2002 and 2003 in each case it played out a changing composition of sonic material specifically chosen to trigger individual memories in the listener. These memories were then recorded into The Memory Machine and became part of the ongoing musical mix that in turn both triggered more memories and were recorded as an memory archive. The changing composition comprised different memories being released into the mix and as they repeated at various intervals different processes were applied to them so that as time went on they became fragmented semantically indistinct and the musicality of the speech became increasingly emphasised in an attempt to mirror some of the workings of individual memory.
It was first shown at Cybersonica in 2002. In this version the aim was to trigger memories in different categories. The sounds that were used to do this related to major historical and cultural events of the previous 60 years such as television theme tunes, pop tunes, radio news broadcasts etc

The end result shown on Sound Cloud is the memories that were produced and recorded by participants of the sound installation. what I find interesting about this is the memories alone have gone into creating new elements of the piece, as words and similar experiences by other people, voices that feel familiar can trigger memories in their own way. Along with popular, well loved sounds such as music, theme tunes, stories, that provide a nostalgic feeling most of the time, the voices provide a far more present and real memory. A word or sound of someone else recalling a memory may make you remember something that happened 1 hour ago or 10 years ago.


In terms of my own sound project, it may be useful for me to consider using some things which are familiar to me, and others, that represent the time period that my sound piece is trying to convey, or the type of situation or feeling that want to make the audience feel.

Feeling for Sound- Further Research

Artangel Commissions-

Artangel is a group that helps commission and produce projects by contemporary artists. In terms of sound design, there are some interesting projects.

Maria Fusco- Master Rock. This piece is a sound/spoken word piece recorded in Ben Cruachan, which is one of the highest peaks in Scotland. In the 1960's it was blasted through to build a power station which remains an important part of the national grid today. 

"Fusco's repertoire for a mountain fuses sound from Cruachan power station with three spoken voices: an Irish tunnel tiger, a forgotten artist, and the voice of the 450 million year-old granite itself."

This piece is interesting in terms of ambience. As it was recorded inside the mountain, all of the voices retain the ambience, the imprint of the mountain. The idea of having the voice of the mountain is also an interesting one. It is as if the artist is trying to give the mountain a point of view, a voice on the whole affair. The sense of old and new is very prevalent in this piece, and again because it is representing something from the past it is applicable with how you represent that through sound.

You can listen to the piece below, which includes an introduction by the artist:

Janet Cardiff- The Missing Voice. I am very familiar with Janet Cardiff's work, and this has been described as her most ambitious project yet. It is a detective fiction/urban guide/film noir type audio walk which starts in the Whitechapel Library. This piece was first created in 1999, but the piece still remains fairly relevant today. As described on the Artangel website

Although The Whitechapel Library closed and the building was absorbed into the neighbouring Whitechapel Gallery, it is surprising how the majority of the walk’s other landmarks – from KFC restaurants to ultra-simple news stands – remain present today, albeit with the occasional change in detail, or paint colour. The effect of this is that The Missing Voice (Case Study B) is accumulating a new kind of intrigue: as we listen to its mysterious, multi-layered tale and compare the narrator’s observations with our own, we observe the drip-drip rate of change on a certain set of London streets

I quite like the idea that because of the minimal change in the landscape since this piece's creation, you can still experience the piece in the same way. In terms of the piece itself, I find that it can inspire imagination in this way. Where does the piece end and the real world begin? Like much of her work it is like she is there with you, like a conscience by your side, whispering in your ear. 

You can download this piece in three parts here: http://www.artangel.org.uk//projects/1999/the_missing_voice_case_study_b/download_and_walk/audio 

Laurie Anderson & Brian Eno- Self Storage. This project is installation/sound exhibition which took users through a storage containment building that can now be walked around and looked in to. Anderson recorded some sound and told some stories based on items that were found in the storage unit. With her recording techniques and the stories she told, which were poetic but detailed, you get a real sense of history with these storage units. It is unsure from listening whether these were fabricated or genuine stories. 

You can listen and see some photographs of the storage unit here: http://www.artangel.org.uk//projects/1995/self_storage/slideshow_with_sound/self_storage

Feeling for Sound- Further Research

Based on the feedback I got for Beyond the Boundaries, I am doing some of the further research that was suggested on my feedback to be able to expand my project.

David Toop-

David Toop is a musician/composer, a writer and a curator who works as a sound artist and as a visiting professor at the University of the Arts in London. My initial research led me to a short interview that was done with him that I found on vimeo. it detailed what he does, where he is working currently and his methods of working. In this video he detailed quite a few interesting thoughts on sound design. he mentioned sound never being in existence. It is always in a state of emergence and decay. He also does a lot of improvisation sessions at the University of the Arts using anything available. He also mentioned a sense of ambience being just about discovered by the wider sound community, and the exploration of it being made of more importance in recent times.

This is the video:

Following on from this I looked up some of his work to see how his theory has been put into his practical work.

The first piece I viewed was Decomposition/Decay which is a sound piece that appears to use instruments and foley to create the piece. The main thing I saw in this was the idea of ambience that he spoke of. The piece is never silent, even in the quieter moments there is always some slight rumble or noise in the piece. For me it is something that I am looking into creating as nothing is ever silent. There is always a slight ambience in a place and I find that particularly fascinating. You can listen to this piece here:

The second piece I looked at was a far more digitally created sounding piece called Tricyrtis Latifolia. This piece includes some voice work and some foley, but it sounds far more digitally created, with a lot of static and interference type sounds. What I see in this, in terms of Toop's working methods is the idea of emergence and decay. In this piece there are lots of sounds coming and going, not necessarily the same sounds either, although as in the previous piece there is always sound in the piece. You can listen to this piece here:

I love the mash up of different kinds of sound design, from digital creation to foley recordings of sounds. Also, the idea that there may have been improvisation elements to this is exciting to me, as the acoustics and results created on that day may always be slightly different depending on who was in the room, what equipment was in there, whether outside sources affected the recordings etc. In terms of my own project, it gives me something to think about in terms of the ambience at the time of recording. I am trying to recreate atmospheres and feelings from the past, partly using ambience, and I need to consider how spaces are going to sound and affect the sound design as a whole.

Indiegogo Fundraising and Trailer/Pre-visualization for Debbie

During all the script writing duties, the rest of the team were working hard making mock storyboards and production breakdowns, working on budgeting etc. We are wanting to raise £1500 for this film and to do this we wanted to make a trailer to give people an idea of what the film would look like, the tone and style and what it is about.

The experience of doing a pre-visualization was good as it allowed us to try out shots we might find difficult and also allowed Thomas to try out some of the VFX for the film and see how that could be created, how long it would take in post etc. Shahid also got an idea of how it should be lit to achieve the effect that I had envisioned. In general it gave a good idea of how much time each shot would take us. All in all it was a good experience.

This is the end result of the video:

In addition to this, we also took photographs of each Team member with information about them, and information about the film. With indiegogo, you can also give people perks dependent on how much money they donate which we will factor into our budget.

We have also launched a Facebook page for people to be able to get updates on our project and what we are up to. Both of these things can be accessed here: 

https://www.facebook.com/debbieFilm/?fref=ts

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/d-eb31e/x/12822846#/

Script Development- Implementation of Feedback and Group Feedback.

After my meeting with Craig, I immediately went back and implemented what he had suggested, especially in terms of structure and it made the film 100% better for it. It flows much better and makes much more sense because of it. At a point I was happier with it, I had a tutorial with Kathleen where she went through some things on the script:

• Amy should be called Jen
• Jarvis wouldn’t wear a watch
• More natural dialogue (Jarvis and Pete)
• Jarvis should look at Debbie on a tablet
• Get rid of toilet scene, drug should be taken in the cafe
• Try the film with and without the narration as it gives away too much of the plot.
• Should get rid of coffee shot at the beginning because people think waitress is main character.
• Shahid’s storyboards don’t match the atmosphere of the film, he needs to meet with Tom more to discuss how shots are set up for VFX.

I went back over and changed some of the things Kathleen said, but I didn't agree with everything she suggested. Then I let the rest of the group have a look. 

Laura gave me a pdf with a lot of notes on, mostly small things to do with dialogue re-wording, and minor details. She had some concerns about the ending, but I disagreed and sent an email to Craig asking for his opinion. He said it was solid, and Laura had a re-read and she agreed that it wasn't as bad as she thought. 

The rest of the group seem to have the same concerns. Shahid mentioned that he didn't like the flashbacks at the end, and felt that it was too 'Fight Club' and that we should have a transition shot instead. Also Lauren voiced a concern about the beginning scene in terms of style and it fitting with the rest of the film.

I agreed with most of what was said by the group, and liked the idea of the transition shot that Shahid mentioned. I also understood Lauren's concern and aim to have a conversation with Shahid to see how it could be lit and shot to allow it to be consistent stylistically. I now think the script is getting to a point of being something that everyone is happy with. Which is perfect and on schedule.

Script Development- Meeting with Craig

After a couple of re-writes of the script, Kathleen sorted out a tutorial with Craig Jordan Baker, the creative writing lecturer on campus to look at my script and give me some feedback on it. I found the meeting very helpful and it really helped me look at the script in a different way. The topics we discussed were:

-Structure
-Dialogue
-Scriptwriting format/technique
-General Feedback

The main thing that was brought up in this meeting was to do with the structure of the script. The structure of it meant that there was too much setup to the story and the ending felt rushed if we were to make a 15 minute film. So his advice was that I introduced Pete's character in a lot earlier, with an establishing scene with him to allow the audience to know why Jarvis is waiting in the cafe and to set up their relationship faster, then to have him arrive by page 4. They then have conversation, and Jarvis is starting to come around to Pete's way of thinking by page 7. This then allows more time for the story to resolve.

The next thing was the actual scriptwriting format. I was writing a sort of mix between a spec script and a shooting script. What Craig advised that in order to focus on the story I leave the shots out at first and then come back to it later and do a full shooting script.

Another thing was that Debbie had more to say than she should have done. If Debbie is an extension of Jarvis's consciousness then she shouldn't say what he's thinking. She should say something that then leads on to him finishing the thought, but not necessarily finishing her sentence.

Other than a few other bits, I asked Craig what he thought of the script in general and he said it could be a strong short film if I got the structure right and improved on the areas we discussed.