Reading Response # 1

Proclaiming the era of the "Futurist" movement, Russolo lays critique to the past-tense of what we know as music: an orchestra of epic proportions, forty violins creating harmonious and breath-taking melodies. He also appears to find all this futile. With his own determined 6 Families of Noises (including groans, explosions, and creaks), he seems to find more beauty in the sounds around us. He states that every noise possesses a tone and sometimes even a harmony. While this may be true, simply by listening so intently, it may be possible he is hearing what he wants to hear. It is not enough to find a noise irritating or disagreeable--we must seek to find what is behind it that leads us to that judgment. Overall I enjoyed this reading, though I certainly found fault with some of Russolo's findings.

Soundwalk Response

Were you able to find places and spaces where you could really listen?

On our walk to the park, traffic was the predominant noise and continued to be up until we began walking on side streets. There, the traffic dissipated somewhat and we could hear many other sounds clearly.

Was it possible to move without making a sound?

Though it may be possible for an individual to produce no real sound while walking, groups of people create many noises such as scuffling and scraping.

What happened when you plugged your ears, and then unplugged them?

With my ears plugged, everything sounded distant and muffled and only the loudest sounds could be heard. I also heard internal noises such as my joints cracking. Unplugging my ears made a huge difference: suddenly everything was in stereo and the small noises I had missed before became clearer. It was also easier to identify the sources.

In your sound log exercise, what types of sounds were you able to hear? List them.

The easiest noises to hear were, of course, traffic related: brakes squealing, the whirring of an engine, buses pulling over to pick up people, and bike tires bouncing along cracked pavement. A sampling of other noises I heard included children laughing, people kicking rocks, construction work on a rooftop, church bells chiming, and signposts swaying slightly in the breeze.

Were you able to differentiate between sounds that had a recognizable source and those sounds you could not place?

I feel like with the most general of noises I encountered, it was very easy to determine the source. However, when noises were exceptionally distant or in a strange location, I definitely knew that was the case.

Human sounds? Mechanical sounds? Natural sounds?

All of those sounds are very distinct--human, mechanical, and natural—thus I feel it was very easy to distinguish one from the other. Human laughter or talking sounds nothing like chainsaws or car movement. Natural is the hardest for me to pick out: perhaps because in the city there isn’t all that much natural to hear.

Were you able to detect subtleties in the ever-present drone?

I feel like that is something I need to get better at. I often got caught up in the pulse of the location we were walking in and forgot to focus my ears on the small noises.

Extremely close sounds? Sounds coming from very far away?

The closer the sound, the simpler it was to acknowledge its presence instead of chalking it up to something your mind creates from the drone itself. Far away noises prompted more of a difficulty in picking them up.

What kinds of wind effects were you able to detect (for example, the leaves of trees don't make sounds until they are activated by the wind)?

The leaves on trees were almost a constant on our walk; they could be heard almost anywhere we went. Things like wind chimes and flagpoles being in the path of a breeze also produced interesting sounds.

Were you able to intervene in the urban landscape and create your own sounds by knocking on a resonant piece of metal, activating wind chimes, etc.?

Though I didn’t personally, people in my group did by scraping their feet against the ground or running their hands along fences and such.

Do you feel you have a new understanding or appreciation of the sounds of our contemporary landscape/cityscape?

I do. I’ve never thought about just absorbing sounds through walking around town. Just listening to common or uncommon things in the city made me more excited and interested in recording my own.

How do you think your soundwalk experience will affect your practice as a media artist, if at all?

It will give me a better understanding of recording sound and manipulating it to my advantage.