I will be performing at electrofringe 2006, in spac[v]e, (performance working title: swarm sands around scapes), using ambisonic field recordings and synthetic spatialisation, granular synthesis, physical modeling and other processes to create and control my sounds on 5 or 6 channels. To make things more interesting to watch than just me at a laptop (or two?), I am thinking of using some kinetic toys to control sounds (via sensors and a microcontroller). The idea is to take my software processes back out into the real world, in the mold of a recent thread of art where computer processes are implemented as real objects. For example, Reuben Margolin’s Square Wave or Daniel Rozin’s Wooden Mirror (both pictured below). I would say this idea also underpins the burgeoning practice of physical computing.
Other points of reference include the venerable SodaConstructor, Ixi software’s SpinOSC, a Japanese project called Modulobe, and Cyrille Henry’s pmpd, which I demonstrated during my Pd masterclass at Electrofringe 2004. Incidentally, I’m not claiming to be doing anything drastically new here, and I note that GCTTCATT used SodaConstructor to control spatial audio at a performance in 2001. Hopefully my idea for some real physical kinetic objects controlling software sound synthesis and spatialisation via physical modeling tools will make for an engaging visual and aural performance. I guess the biggest risk is to lose the elegance of simplicity by using so many ideas in one performance. That is definitely something to work on avoiding…. OR - maybe I can make something out of excessive fiddly complexity!?!
