Since October 2020, I have been collecting audio recordings while I run along a specific path in Istanbul's Maçka Park. The project began as a class assignment to explore a non-human ecological relationship through sound. The process was so enjoyable and so ear- and mind- opening that I haven't been able to stop myself. This page is a collecting point for some of my outcomes.
Fall-Winter 2020-2021. "Knowing the Park Through Running"
This was a podcast style introduction to my sonic adventures in the park. It introduces concepts of listening and soundscape from authors such as Steven Feld, Helmi Jarviluoma, and of course R Murray Schafer. I also borrow a passage from Murakami's memoir "What I Talk About When I Talk About Running". This ends with my first composition based on my experiences of sounding in the park. This was shared in the MIAM Colloquium in January 2021 alongside my classmates in Dr Robert Beahr's Sound Ecology class.
This was a podcast style introduction to my sonic adventures in the park. It introduces concepts of listening and soundscape from authors such as Steven Feld, Helmi Jarviluoma, and of course R Murray Schafer. I also borrow a passage from Murakami's memoir "What I Talk About When I Talk About Running". This ends with my first composition based on my experiences of sounding in the park. This was shared in the MIAM Colloquium in January 2021 alongside my classmates in Dr Robert Beahr's Sound Ecology class.
Spring 2021. Transcribing, Composing, Improvising
Research this semester lead me to think about how to notate the sound environment I experienced in the park. I experimented with traditional music staff notation, I used sonic visualiser to compare the background "noise" over time, and made timeline / event based approaches which looked more at the ecological and social networks that unfolded. My ultimate goal was once again to end up with a compositional outcome. I intended trying to use extended techniques within a chamber music ensemble to capture the sounds through purely acoustic means. This proved incredibly frustrating and I turned instead to the social nature of free improvisation. With the help of the MIAM Improvisation Ensemble, we created - in our isolated online class sessions - a performance that really captured the social feeling of being alone but with others in the park. Each member improvised along with my sound-run recording separately: a purely acousmatic experience where the source material is hidden from view. I combined these tracks in Ableton Live with minimal edits (but quite a bit of work in the mixing) to result in the work: Run With Me.
Research this semester lead me to think about how to notate the sound environment I experienced in the park. I experimented with traditional music staff notation, I used sonic visualiser to compare the background "noise" over time, and made timeline / event based approaches which looked more at the ecological and social networks that unfolded. My ultimate goal was once again to end up with a compositional outcome. I intended trying to use extended techniques within a chamber music ensemble to capture the sounds through purely acoustic means. This proved incredibly frustrating and I turned instead to the social nature of free improvisation. With the help of the MIAM Improvisation Ensemble, we created - in our isolated online class sessions - a performance that really captured the social feeling of being alone but with others in the park. Each member improvised along with my sound-run recording separately: a purely acousmatic experience where the source material is hidden from view. I combined these tracks in Ableton Live with minimal edits (but quite a bit of work in the mixing) to result in the work: Run With Me.
I am curious to compare the changes in the background / general sound: what RM Schafer would call the "flat line" or Francois Augoyard would refer to as the "drone effect". To do this, I turned to the program Sonic Visualiser. By lining up audio slices from a series of sound-runs and running them through the same transforms in Sonic Visualiser, I could start to see some of what I heard in the background. It is no surprise that there are differences and similarities. Now I am trying to connect these appearances to changes in time, season, and weather - especially the humidity. More on that to come. For more information, see this unpublished paper below.
| sounding_in_the_park__my_place_in_the_acoustic_community_as_a_runner.pdf |
