Using Non-Traditional Voices in Synthesized Electronics
I am a sound artist – performing works of sonic sculpture.
“Nothing ought to be taken for granted in today’s world: terms such as “sound,” “noise,” “music” must be interrogated and redefined so as to better describe the complexities of our present moment”
I use sound as opposed to music – expand. Hence the terms sound artist, sonic sculpture.
My background: radio (wireless) listening as a youngster Radio Caroline, Luxembourg expand on merging of sound, VU, early tape recording, old photos (1800s), old film (silent era)
“finding beauty in decay”
I would say - try to identify your own artistic voice – whether this is as a musician, sound artist, visual artist, multimedia artist etc. It has to be about you and your life experiences – not about buying gear or about copying what others are doing – though its good to experience what others are doing and have influences.
With that in mind acquiring the latest technology or following trends are not always the answer. Looking back is as important as looking forward IMO. My interest is in ideas – not gear. Personally I try to use second hand equipment as much as possible and ignore as much as possible the latest ads for new and improved versions of gear. Too much gear I think stifles creativity. Simplicity tends to give you more.
I would say the most important things are to find out what is most important to you. Do some soul searching, keep a diary of your ongoing thoughts relating to sound or music. Its all about the journey and not about the end result.
Personally I’m not big on developments such as sound movement (spatial sound) which I find rather distracting – even relating to stereo. Often it seems like – do it - just because you can do it – rather than does this add anything to the sonic experience – or is this really my artistic voice. I firmly enjoy mono recordings – similar to my passion for old photographs and film.
Personally I use location recordings, found sound, organized sounds and other unusual sound sources as my basic sound and via techniques such as microsound and granular synthesis transform into my own unique sonic environments. Most of my sound work is textural.
Lets look at two important schools that influence what I do - Musique Concrète and Microsound.
Musique Concrète
Musique Concrète is a type of music composition that utilizes ‘recorded sounds’ as raw material. These sounds are often modified through the application of audio effects and tape manipulation techniques, and may be assembled into a type of sound collage. This was movement was spearheaded by French composer Pierre Schaeffer beginning in the early 1940s - who started of using early shellac records before moving on to (newer technology) such as tape recorders utilized in radio station studios.
He modified existing devices and techniques or created new devices in order to take steps forward into new musical possibilities. In many cases this extended beyond traditional musical concepts, leading to the creation of new musical form and content that had not been previously imagined.
If you are interested in the developments in this field also explore the work from this time of Pierre Henry, Luc Ferrari, Pierre Boulez, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Edgar Varèse, and Iannis Xenakis.
Since these early explorations new instruments have been designed from these concepts giving the possibilities to build sound forms and new musical forms from the ground up.
Microsound
Microsound lies beneath the level of the note. These forms remained hidden from mankind until fairly recent technological developments.
Microsonic techniques dissolve the rigid bricks of musical architecture and the result is that sounds may coalesce, evaporate, or mutate into other sounds. Dense collections of particles form swirling sound clouds whose shapes evolve over time.
This developed from the work of Nobel prize winning physicist Dennis Gabor during the 1940s. Amongst other things he built a machine to granulate sound into particles.
Microsound generally concerns microacoustic phenomena lasting less than one tenth
of a second. The real academic development of microsound occurred from the 1970s – 90s. During the 2000s electronic equipment has been developed that utilizes these concepts. Much of the work has been accomplished by software programmers and eurorack developers.
Granular Synthesis is a type of microsound. Sound is broken up into grains. These grains can be reworked in various ways. Grains can be played back as clouds or drones or in a variety of different ways.
My other main influences include:
Drones, Repetition, Silence and Lowercase
Drones and repetition are a really primal thing.
Drones go back to very early music and sound making – meditation, chanting etc.
Repetition are similar to mantras – which are repeated sounds used to aid meditation.
Silence – an important attribute of all sound works. No silence is like talking without ever taking a breath.
Lowercase is an extreme form of sound minimalism where very quiet, usually unheard sounds are amplified to extreme levels.
Sonic Sculpture
I mentioned sonic sculpture at the beginning – and a large part of what I do is merging sounds together in a live situation – much like what a sculptor would do with their physical materials. As I mentioned all of my materials, the final step - mixing and improvisation are very important components to a successful end result.
© 2020 Jimmy Peggie