And the rest is noise...

Instead of lulling you to sleep the new gadget in the picture produces a variable “soundscape”. And for those who live in a noisy neighborhood and are prone to sleep disturbances  the novelty of this machine lies in the fact that if its sensor detects extra noise in your bedroom, its generators start producing extra noise. A cloak of noise to mask ... noise! Smart move.

I thought that all you need to get a repairing sleep is quiet, but I may be wrong.

I even thought that these sudden bursts of noise, which seem to be the main feature of this contraption, could cause a lot of damage if experienced frequently. I’ve heard, for example, that when your sleep is interrupted by these noise bursts your body cannot generate insulin which in turn can lead into diabetes.

Don’t just take my word. Go get one of these Ecotones and find out for yourself... If you don’t get diabetes after a few years it is possible that I was wrong.

Great documentary (2)

Soundwalkers from raquel castro on Vimeo

Here’s the final cut of Raquel Castro’s film “Soundwalkers”, about which I wrote something here on Fragments (check it here), when it premiered in Lisbon.

No cause for alarm

Charles Darwin is a name you hear quite often these days. He wrote the following:

“Not a single domestic animal can be named which has not in some country dropping ears; and the view suggested by some authors, that the dropping is due to the disuse of the muscles of the ear, from the animals not being alarmed by danger, seems probable.”

For the acoustic ecologist there is a strong metaphor in here somewhere I’m sure...

The end of muzak? (2)

Following my previous post about Muzak Holdings filling for bankruptcy I feel the need to complement my previous  commentary. I have been involved in acoustic ecology studies since 1974. My interest in this area stemmed from two facts. Firstly, in those days I was disappointed with my "career" as a musician and composer. I felt that (my) music was becoming more and more meaningless, and that some sense of purposefulness was urgently necessary. Secondly, I sensed a gradual and growing public "deafness". People were talking, making music and other sounds but  they weren't listening. I became aware of the acoustic environment because I became aware of its mechanisms. You don't pay attention to your ears until they hurt, and ordinarily you shouldn't have to pay attention to the acoustic environment's mechanisms either. They're just there for grabs! 

The centre of the global crisis is deafness. No one's listening properly anymore. 

Your voice will never be heard unless you shout, with everybody shouting you close your ears, the more you close your ears the worst  the situation becomes. This situation has not changed in 35 years. It has probably become even worse.

Humans are sonic creatures. Look at us! Look at the workings and the extent of the evolutionary process on our listening and voice production apparatus. There used to be a balance between sound making  and listening. In balanced societies there's no such thing as noise and deafness. You produce whatever sounds you have to and listening  is not a capability you are discouraged to practice. Even some musicians, I feel, seem a bit deaf sometimes...

Within this seemingly atrocious panorama (purposefully distorted, I'll give you that, to help understand my point of view...)  professional sound makers have the greatest responsibility in producing purposeful and balanced sound. In music, radio, television,  the interactive technologies, but in fact in any situation in which human acoustic communication is involved we are probably the example everybody else would look up to. 

Muzak Holdings is not the cause of all evil in the world. They are probably even genuinely convinced that they have a positive role in society. But their product is no less toxic than sub-prime mortgages. If we detain ourselves over the problem of the production of useless, sonic garbage we must come to the conclusion that Muzak is its most successful example and its greatest symbol. 

Anything that can reverse this situation is thus more than welcomed. When one finds out that the greatest producer of sonic dump in the universe is closing its doors due to the competition of other companies, themselves about to close their doors also, one cannot but feel happy. 

You want to know why? Because we have enough competitiveness. We need solidarity instead. Solidarity is dialog and dialog is listening. 

Forget about global warming, the sub-prime crisis or financial toxic products. We have become totally deaf! Human sonic waste has clouded the Earth for long, it prevents acoustic communication channels from functioning properly, and yet we seem to neglect to see that this is the origin of many of our problems. 

Acoustic privacy is not mentioned in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and unfortunately there are no legal grounds for suing Muzak for attempted crimes against human rights, but that is just a legal matter...

The end of muzak? (1)

Muzak Holdings filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. This is surely sad news for its workers.  But even if it doesn’t mean the end of piped music, the consequences and the symbolism of all these events constitute a chance to enter an era of aural hygiene that I salute and consider a great opportunity...

Teen deterrent

This site recently caught my attention. The company manufactures a product called “The Mosquito”. This product is based on the fact that the youth have a far better hearing acuity than their elders. The device works by emitting a very high-pitched noise that only that fresh, unspoiled organ of Corti can perceive.  They justify the production of The Mosquito because, in their words, “The biggest security concern for construction companies today is liability for injuries to unauthorized persons on building sites. This is often the result of kids gaining access to a compound and using it as a play area after work has finished for the day.” In the end they also claim that the product helps control anti-social behavior. 

This raises several legitimate (I think!) questions. 

Why is there a product targeted at kids as if they were a plague in need of an almost divine intervention? Does the word “education” ever came up in the dictionaries of this product’s developers? What happens when other products and social mores ruin the hearing acuity of the youth? Shouldn’t there be some coordination between environmental authorities, commercial and social institutions in order to assess potentially hazardous products like this? Are we going to see mutual accusations of unfair trade practices...? What about bats, dogs? What about adults with good hearing and no anti-social habits? Are we condemned to having to cope with these mosquitoes? Who’s going to defend us from having to be exposed to products such as this in our daily lives? Plague control companies?

Sad news

Michael Waiszvisz (1949-2008)

Great documentary (1)

I've just returned from watching a great new documentary titled Soundwalkers directed by my friend, video director and sound researcher Raquel Castro. An intensely and splendidly researched and illustrated work, beautifully and masterfully crafted.

Its density turns it almost into a fairly comprehensive catalogue of the entire repertoire of the acoustic ecology field. But Raquel's documentary also touches, almost imperceptibly, upon the political dimension of this theme, an issue in my view rarely, if ever, present but desperately needed in the AE debate.

For those of you interested in acoustic ecology I strongly recommend that you watch this documentary wherever you have the chance to catch it. 

Check out the web version here.

Fragments of a mutant reality

Hearing is believing

My wife took her car to the auto-shop today. The mechanic asked her what seemed to be the trouble with the car and she explained that she thought that one of the cylinders was not working. "Maybe a faulty spark plug," she said. "You'll have to start the engine," he replied, "I have to see" and he pointed to his ear. She started the engine and he immediately -- and I mean, immediately!-- noticed that there was a problem with at least one cylinder.

She thought for a moment that this was a precipitated gesture but later he repeated: "I can hear through the exhaust tube if the cylinders are all working properly.”

Hearing is believing.

Not long ago I read that new technicians at the French Citröen factory are trained to distinguish a “vocabulary” of over 20 sounds that identify multiple engine malfunctions. 

Feeling alive

A friend told me an interesting story about a relative who was in the intensive care unit of a local hospital. He remained connected to all sorts of noisy medical equipment. According to his testimony the different noises of that equipment helped him feel that he was alive, as each specific noise corresponded to a certain organ that was functioning properly. Listening to the noises thus meant that the flame was still on. 

Standing dead basses

The aura of music

I recently watched an interview on TV with the Romanian conductor Sergiu Celibidache. Among many other interesting issues, Celibidache discusses the problem of recording versus concert. He dismissed the former in favor of the latter based on the uniqueness and unrepeatability of the live performance. It is interesting that Celibidache uses a recorded video to manifest his thoughts on this issue.

This is of course a variation of concept of aura that Walter Benjamin explored in his famous article "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" (if you can read Portuguese I wrote a paper on this; you can get it here.) Celibidache is not the only musician I've heard addressing this problem.

The question I asked in my article is basically the following: to what extent can we talk discuss the concept of aura when we evaluate works such as John Chowning's pioneering 'Turenas', a piece conceived and produced digitally that does not exist outside of the digital matrix? In other words, how is 'Turenas' physically present? And is it possible to obtain a unique and unrepeatable work that is conceived for a medium that allows infinite and perfect repeatability?

Where is, under these terms. the aura of the digital culture? Does Benjamin's concept make any sense, particularly in this day and age? 

Deep time of media

It has been some time since I have learned so much from a single book. If you are a student of media, expression of thought or the scientific origins of its associated technologies, this book Deep Time of the Media: Toward an Archaeology of Hearing and Seeing by Technical Means (Electronic Culture: History, Theory, and Practice) by Siegfried Zielinski is a must for you.

Listen

There's one particular aspect of the creative output of the artists that leads to what I have seen described as perceiving reality through their eyes. Under this principle, when we admire a picture by a certain painter or read a novel by a certain writer we are perceiving reality through this particular painter or writer's sensitivity. Sometimes this might not necessarily be a privilege... 

But what is the reality depicted by a creative musician or a composer? If we can depict the complexity of reality through art (probably one of Art's eternal goals) what is then the "listenable" dimension of reality (this is a book yet to be written...) and how can we portray it? The problem is that what we can perceive of this portray or the "listenable" dimension of reality reaches us through... listening.

We cannot see it.

And in this day and age of easy and carefree listening, of course, we are probably missing not only an important part of our surroundings but also a great deal of what sound artists and composers senses attempt to convey.