sonic surrounds

I think this is an audaciously brilliant response to the present proliferation of sound artists working with field recordings (brought about largely by cheaper technology of a suitable quality)…

It’s probably not a particularly new idea, given the history of musique concrete, noise machines, the ideas of John Cage, etc (although i’m certainly not an expert on this history). Also, an idea like this is impressive just in the official support that would be required from the host city to approve and pull it off.  For instance, I don’t imagine seeing this in London without a really big name behind it.

I’m speaking of a live sound performance by Staalplaat Soundsystem and others, “playing” the trains, travellers, bicycles and other occupants of the Central Station in The Hague, Netherlands (see the description & video below).

Isn’t this exactly what many field recording artists are attempting to do in producing/performing sound montages?  - i.e. create some sort of musical composition comprised of the timbres, rhythms and frequencies of disparate sound elements in a way you would never hear them together in life? In this performance, a simple video documentary by one audience member records (a lower quality version) of the type of sound field recording composers attempt often - but in this performance, every member of the audience would have had a unique experience, mediated by their own existence and movements within the performance site…  it’s so much more than a composition playing back from a laptop, improvised or not.

Station to Station @ TodaysArt08 from mediateletipos on Vimeo.

TODAYS ART 2008
FRIDAY 26th Sep 2008, The Hague (NL)
[performance] @ CENTRAL STATION - 19:00

STAALPLAAT SOUNDSYSTEM, MIKE RIJNIERSE, ACHIM WOLLSCHEID, MARK BAIN AND ERIK HOBIJN : STATION TO STATION
Amsterdam / Berlin (NL / DE)

This opening performance is not just any performance. It uses instruments, but highly unusual ones; the Central Station-building itself, including all the people and other sources of sound, such as machines, are interpreted by the artists as instruments. This performance does not distinguish between ‘music’ and ’sound’. As a part of the act, in cooperation with NS (=the Dutch railroad company), a whole range of trains and trams will enter the station in a strict choreography called The Tsunami, with all the train and tram engineers working together. Sounds from travellers will also be amplified through microphones as part of the performance, and Achim Wollscheid will use computer-driven magnets that play the bicycles in front of the station like a toposonic typewriter. The performance is formed by a collaboration between Staalplaat Soundsystem, Mike Rijnierse, Achim Wollscheid, Mark Bain and Erik Hobijn.

[via ../mediateletipos)) blog]

from ../mediateletipos))) by blanca rego

There seem to be many ambisonic microphones popping up around the place - both high-end and mid-range commercial microphones, as well as home-built DIY microphones.

Here are some photos and links.
(all images’ copyright owned by their respective manufacturers).

The premier ambisonic microphone range by Soundfield is soon to include a (presumably cheaper) A-Format microphone, the SPS200 (pdf link).

AGM Digital are redeveloping their MR1, originally developed with Danish Pro Audio using matched B&K 4011 capsules.

Core Sound are about to release their TetraMic a-format ambisonic microphone.

On the DIY side:
In 2005, I made my own DIY ambisonic microphone using Panasonic electret capsules, which turned out to be great quality for a cost of around $300.

Also in 2005, Etienne Deleflie built his Sound Thief ambisonic microphone using Rode NT5 microphone parts (capsule and phantom preamps).

Earlier, Henry J. Walmsley had already built his own ambisonic microphone also using Panasonic capsules.

In late 2006, I heard of two more new DIY ambisonic mics:
Rafael Kassier’s mic built from Oktava capsules:

and Paul Doornbusch’s beautifully constructed DIY mic built with Transound capsules:

Probably you could find out about more diy ambi mics by joining the Sursound list.

here’s a screenshot of the Pd interface that I developed to perform for Electrofringe 2006.

click on the image for full sized version:

I made heavy use of the (now quite usable) Graph on Parent feature - so that I could instantiate abstraction subpatches that created each of those GUI blocks in the patch.

Blocks aren’t really well labeled in this screenshot, but from left to right, top to bottom, these are the abstractions I developed and used in the patch:

• on the first row:
• a timer (clock), so i know how long i’ve been playing
• a “heartbeat” synth i made which emits a nice low bass pulse
• then three instances of the same ambisonic audio file player (that plays back my 4 channel ambisonic field recordings, and decodes them to 5 channel surround format)
• a single instance of a stereo audio file player
• on the second row:
• two instances of my 5 channel granulator - based on an improved version of the stereo granulator i’ve released elsewhere on my website
• a surround glitch/pop generator based on filtered single sample impulses with controlled stochastic triggering and panning
• and on the final row:
• a CPU load meter
• DSP switch
• mixer for all the abstractions, grouped into foreground and background sounds
• and the 5 channel output and recorder - which was the last thing i implemented, and seemed unreliable, so i didn’t use it to record my performance live. i’ll record a version sometime soon.

DIY shockmount, boom pole, blimp and furry windscreen

DIY Mic Windscreen (Zeppelin)

DIY Microphone Blimp