The first time I came across a connection between physics and music was when reading Cosmos, by Carl Sagan. It’s a book on the history of our universe, with many insights on how science developed and how it influenced our civilization. The chapter that stayed with me the most was ‘The Harmony of the World’,… Continue reading Music of the Spheres
Author: Maria Grigoriu
What Does Space Sound Like? Like Harry Potter!
I recently happened upon a concert at the Royal Albert Hall that made me think about the relationship between science and art. Space Station Earth is an orchestral composition by Ilan Eshkeri set to footage from space provided by ESA (European Space Agency). Through strings, percussion, synths and human voices, the scope of the composition… Continue reading What Does Space Sound Like? Like Harry Potter!
Visiting Practitioner Series: Samson Young
The works discussed were: Palazzo Gundane (homage to the myth-maker who fell to earth) 2017 Possible Music #1 & #2 (feat. NESS) The Immortals The World Falls Apart Into Facts (2019 / revised 2020) The piece that stuck with me the most was Possible Music. A colaboration with NESS (Next Generation Sound Synthesis) from the… Continue reading Visiting Practitioner Series: Samson Young
Visiting Practitioner Series: Makoto Oshiro
Berlin-Tokyo based performer and artist, founder of label Basic Function. His practice si focused on self-made instruments, improvisations and audio-visual installation work. Self-made instruments Kachi – Kachi The instrument uses electromagnetic relay. A relay is an electrically operated switch used to switch higher voltage from lower voltages. It consists of a coil wrapped around a… Continue reading Visiting Practitioner Series: Makoto Oshiro
Final Project
Quite different than what I aimed for starting this course. The main element that remained from my initial intentions was the use of common sounds from around the house. I was keen on tapping into the graphic score idea. I spent quite a long time gathering ideas for a video and trying things out with… Continue reading Final Project
Talking Piano
As my piece has to do with silenced voices I have been looking at ways to construct metaphors around the voice. Using it’s texture as an instrument by sampling is a fairly popular approach, but how about using it as information to control a different instrument? Peter Ablinger is exploring this in his extensive Quadraturen… Continue reading Talking Piano
Service
What makes church music sound so distinctive? First of all, quartal harmony, according to Twentieth – Century Harmony (V. Persichetti). Simple melodies composed of small steps. The Dorian mode seems to work best. Male voices. Wide, dark reverb. A rough draft of an idea included below. It did not fit into this current project’s theme… Continue reading Service
The Woven Sounds
The past few weeks have been spent thinking of ways to incorporate weaving into my project. It sprung many creative ideas, the main struggle seems to be transferring them into sound. Although I was set onto basing my project on Romanian traditional practices, I recently came across an Iranian custom known by the name of… Continue reading The Woven Sounds
Oramics
I was surprised to find out the involvement of Daphne Oram with drawn sound, which is something I took an interest in reading about sound art in Russia and Evgeny Sholpo’s Variophone. It’s quite a popular practice translating the sound into visuals but it somehow never occurred to me that it could be done the… Continue reading Oramics
Graphic Scores
Since that Louise Bourjeois exhibition I find myself pretty set on sewing and weaving and finding a way of somehow incorporating these in my project. I set out to build a small loom out of an old frame. My initial intention was to use the final ‘cloth’ resulted as a form of graphic score. Sadly,… Continue reading Graphic Scores