Arduino automata ukulele

Last night my pal Ryan posted a video of some fab kinetic sound art works via Facebook.  I was so impressed with the delightfully simple use of DC motors in tandem with equally simple materials, I rushed home from work today and dug out my Arduino for the first time in ages to get some automata action happening with a couple of motors and my trusty uke.  The code is very simple – rotate left/right, variable speed and timing.  A bit silly, but maybe a point of departure for some more thoughtful work in the future.

Attempted Tomatoes

A non-music/art post!  It’s been awhile since I’ve let life’s other pursuits corrupt my blog.

Our vegetable patch currently sports some varieties of lettuce, spring onions and parsley and will (hopefully) soon have some roma/cherry tomatoes for the picking once the brutal sun bears down upon us Adelaide folk this summer.  Expect updates on this – I’ve got to break the monotony of these reported artistic pursuits somehow.

R.I.P Maryanne Amacher (1943-2009)

Highly influential electronic musician and sound artist Maryanne Amacher has died.  She is best known for her highly innovative installation works and philosophies on the act of listening.

Pitchfork has an obituary: http://pitchfork.com/news/36893-rip-experimental-sound-artist-maryanne-amacher/

I am now on Soundart whiteboard

A good looking ning.  Check it and my profile out here: http://www.thesoundboard.net/profile/TristanLouthRobinsredrobin

Video: Infuser @ ARIspace

Infuser has now been bumped-out of the ARIspace.  Shortly before packing it away I shot some documentation.

Masters: the final leg

I thought it was about time I posted something relating to my Masters research project which I’ve been undertaking since 2006.  It’s been a long hard journey in the ensuing years, but I’m pleased to say that it’s beginning to come to a timely conclusion.  Since 2007 I’ve been going at it part-time, a result of having a freak-out and failing dramatically at balancing the whole work/study ratio in 2006 when I was cocky enough to believe I could handle it full-time.  The period from 2007 to the present hasn’t been that much easier, but at least I’ve been afforded a bit more breathing space by only having check in with my supervisors half as much, write/research half as much and be able to earn a living at the same time.

The research (to once again, refresh your memory) examines the act of listening within the context of sound art, and how a particular form of listening – what I have dubbed as focused listening – is inherent to specific forms of sound art.  The research is broken into three main sections:

1) A definition of what focused listening is, using composer James Tenney’s concept of focus and applying this model to both musical and artistic contexts.

2) A study of works by composer Alvin Lucier and sound artist Rolf Julius respectively, making particular note of their aesthetic and how focused listening is endorsed in their works.  A key work from each artists oeuvre is then analysed.

Alvin Lucier (image: alucier.weslyan.com)

Rolf Julius - warum rot, warum schwarz (2007) (image: momak.go.jp)

3)  The works of Lucier and Julius inform the following section which documents three creative works by the author (i.e. me), two installation works (Infuser [2007/2009], Sumi [2007-2008]) and a concert film (190409 [2009]).  Although the installation works have more in common with Lucier and Julius with respect to aesthetic and focused listening, 190409 is an important inclusion as it encapsulates a significant part of my practice since mid-2008, which has been live performance and the examination of the role of listening in live sound art.

Infuser (2007, revised 2009) – exhibited at ARIspace (October 2009)

Sumi (2007-2008) – home studio set-up (December 2008)

190409 (2009) – exhibited at the Adelaide Festival Centre (Moving Image Program, July-September 2009)

So far so good, so what’s left to do?

I’m currently writing a commentary chapter that will examine other areas of (particularly, performance based) sound art where focused listening is apparent, looking specifically at the work of Sachiko M(atsubura), Francisco Lopez and Philip Jeck.  This chapter is intended as a way of bringing things more into the 21st Century and speculating where listening in situated within these examples and the present tense.

Then it’s a conclusion, compiling the portfolio and we’re done and dusted come February 13th 2010.  That’s right, I’ve set a fixed date for submission!

So I’m pretty content at the moment, save for the fact that my final presentation at the University (a Music Technology Forum gig) last week was a listless, flaccid calamity.  If I have a resolution to make for the new year it will be to get my knack back for giving decent presentations.  It must have been apparent to the audience that this research project has been dragging on a little too long and I’m a bit over talking about it at length.

Now it’s time for tea, scones and some heavy duty tome-ing.

Infuser bump-in @ ARIspace

This morning I set up Infuser in the ARIspace (Melbourne Street, North Adelaide) ahead of the Art Of Tea exhibition organised by the Helpmann Academy. The space is most ideal for the work in terms of atmosphere and the acoustics are rather good. I decided upon a new configuration of the work to suit its arrangement on a large white plinth, with the cables looped around the teapot’s lids and drawn out to form lines across the surface of the plinth. I think it compliments the nature of the work well.

The exhibition opened later this morning, though the ‘official’ opening will be at 6pm tomorrow night (Tuesday) at ARIspace, 209 Melbourne Street, North Adelaide.

Mic mods

I’m awfully silly sometimes.  It’s additionally frustrating when this silliness is a by-product of deluded intuition.  The other night I decided I would try to modify my long suffering Sony stereo condenser microphone – extending the -/+ cables out a little so I’d be able to use each of the microphones independently and stick them in areas that would be otherwise inaccessible with the original microphone.

Well, this modification half worked.  One of the microphones has been temporarily rendered useless, as the solder from one of the mic’s connection points broke off.  It’s that microscopic, that I can’t feasibly cope with fixing it at the moment.  So…one microphone remains, and thankfully it works a treat.  I just wish I’d been a little more careful whilst I was taking it all apart, and I’ve really got to stop drinking wine when I do this kind of thing.

Pulling apart a perfectly good stereo condensor mic

Extending the +/- cables out, soldering, taping, etc.

Some of the original casing goies back on

Resonances here we come...

Tube: Recording #2

I thought I’d follow up the previous post with another recording made on Sunday afternoon.  This recording boasts a heavier shower and some violent windy squalls.  I realise now I should have gotten some video capture of the backyard whilst the audio was being recorded – it would have made a decent spectacle.

I’m thinking of compiling some more of these recordings for a release sometime – using various recording technologies and objects in consort with various locations, as I’ve been doing for the past year.  We’ll see…

Recording #2 – Length 5:30, 9.1 MB / 320 kbps

Tube: Recording #1

A standard pipe is set up on the backyard lawn with a brick placed at either end, a small gap is made between the brick and the pipe to allow the air to pass through. A stereo condensor microphone is positioned in the middle of the pipe.

Good old stormy weather.  After doing a bit of rudimentary gardening this morning I found a length of pipe that our landlord had left lying around.  I soon found out (in my typical methods) that it had a fantastic resonance!  With the incoming rain on my mind, I decided to set the pipe up in the backyard and get some ‘treated’ recordings, not unlike my glass jar recordings back in June.  I placed a brick at either end of the pipe with a small gap, to 1) counter wind clipping, and 2) accentuate the pipe’s resonances.  A stereo condenser microphone was placed in the middle of the pipe.  The recording below is an 7 1/2 minute snapshot of an afternoon shower.

What you will hear in the recording is the beginning of a shower, becoming heavier, then lighter and passing over.  A minute passes as another lighter shower begins.

I love the way this kind of recording technique hints at the anticipation of sound events – i.e. you can hear the resonance increase as the rain gets heavier, and the tapping on the pipe is a dead giveaway.  What I especially enjoy about  this type of recording technique is the way that sound events are altered by the objects resonance – for example around 7:00 when our neighbour starts hammering something and a trains horn sounds in the distance.

Recording #1 – Length 7:34, 17.3 MB / 320 kbps