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Sounds can be
thought of as belonging to a certain location
or time. They are reminders of specific events,
or generic places. When ambient sounds are recorded
and/or presented as a document or representation
of a particular time or place, they are in competition
with the existing jumble of ambient sound belonging
to the site of perception. With digital recording
technologies the mechanism for this re-presentation
is high fidelity, not immediately evident, but
still audible.
With digital editing, recordings of different
geographical locations and temporal moments
can be combined. Mapped on the screen as discrete
units, they can be recombined to form new spaces.
Elements are looped, stretched and structured
to create a narrative, relating both to the
sources and their mode of re-presentation. Technology
and recording represent the environment, but
in doing so create their own spaces, and add
their own content.
The virtual space where sounds are stored is
both structural in terms of organisation, and
a generator of its own ambient sound. The ever
present static can be removed, or amplified
and ordered.
The noise of mechanical failure, power surges,
buzzes and clicks can become familiar, backgrounded
yet still structural elements. Field recordings
are not only the romanticised recordings of
nature, but also with the involvement of technology
include magnetic interference and the possibility
of surveillance.
Music and Architecture are relevant fields,
how digital manipulation of sound can blur the
distinction between the two. Spatial sounds
are Musicalised through repetition and organisation,
and with Musical elements the computer can add
effects we recognise from real spatial situations,
echo and reverberation.
The posibilities of layering, looping and constructing
sound events point to the manipulation of time,
not just space. I seek to combine these elements,
of source, recording / editing mediums, and
playback, as equally co-dependant, the listener
freely shifting emphasis.
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