Cartographic musical notation
Disquiet Junto Project 0073: Faulty Notation
This week’s Disquiet Junto project is about earthquakes. Each participant receives a distinct section of a map of the San Andreas Fault. The section will be interpreted as a graphic notation score. The resulting music will, in the words of Geoff Manaugh of BLDG BLOG, “explore the sonic properties of the San Andreas Fault.”
Full instructions at soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/info
Implementation
I’m never a particularly big fan of graphic notation projects … either there should be a structure or there shouldn’t. Nevertheless, I love maps so my take was on a piece inspired by the particular map. I was influenced by some of the contours and marks, but ultimately I wanted a cohesive piece first. The piece of the map I was provided with was:
I was inspired to use a couple of Soniccouture sound libraries (Abstrakt Bass and Bowed Piano), but the main melodic line came from Boscomac’s superb Air Piano Reaktor ensemble. I played some lines that I felt encapsulated the map in front of me. Just one take (clearly!) as I didn’t want to get too bogged down on going back in and effectively re-scoring (and my keyboard skills are limited).
Some chaotic loops were added to represent some of the fault lines and to stop the track simply being another wash of noise.
Credits
More on this 73rd Disquiet Junto project, which involves reading a map of the San Andreas Fault as if it were a graphic notation score, at:
disquiet.com/2013/05/23/disquie…073-faultynotation
This project was conducted as part of a course of study led by Geoff Manaugh (BLDG BLOG). More on his research at: bldgblog.blogspot.com/2013/01/san-an…for-fault.html
More details on the Disquiet Junto at: soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/info
Home/place/sound
Disquiet Junto Project 0072: Domestic Score
Quoting Marc Wiedenbaum “This week’s project is based on field recordings of wherever it is that you live. The goal is to produce a relaxing score to your domestic life by employing noises that intrude on that life.”
Full instructions at: soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/info
Information:
I went several different ways in creating this, but ultimately all was created with a (hastily repaired) doorbell, a noisy transformer for the burglar alarm, and the sound of birdsong through the open window, each of which very much defines the background sound of my home (without its inhabitants who usually bring with them the sound of televisions blaring).
My doorbell is pretty strident, so I had to blur it sonically using Max for Live’s Granulator. Similarly the transformer was also processed with Granulator to give it some harmonic content. The birdsong (and the drone of distant traffic) was left pretty much as it was recorded, but faded in throughout the track.
Credits:
Photograph: @echosonic
More on this 72nd Disquiet Junto project, which involves making a domestic score from sounds recorded in your own home, at: disquiet.com/2013/05/16/disquie…072-domesticscore/
More details on the Disquiet Junto at: soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/info
And here’s the trailer itself
Following on from yesterday’s post, here’s the video trailer itself:
Sense the Wind Trailer: Disquiet Junto Project 0071: Wind Music from echosonic on Vimeo.
Some trailer soundtracking …
Disquiet Junto Project 0071: Wind Music
Quoting Disquiet.com’s Marc Wiedenbaum: “This week’s project is straightforward. It is an exercise in scoring for video. The video is one minute and four seconds long. It is the trailer to a film now in development. The title of the film is Sense the Wind and the director is Christine Knowlton. The subject of the film is blind sailors. The fact that film is about people for whom hearing is especially important made it very attractive. The director is excited to hear, and see, what we come up with. As her @SenseTheWind Twitter feed states of the film: “Blind sailors race across open water, learning not to fear what they cannot see — on boats or on land.”
Instructions:
soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/info
Information:
A few notes were taken when playing through the video on movement, direction and narrative peaks. Generally the flow of any trailer is to peak toward the end, but there were some definite emotional “moments” through the early and central parts of the trailer.
I uploaded the video and its soundtrack to Logic Pro and began plotting out some trombone and cello parts using Kontakt. These were augmented by a simple ebowed guitar part (fairly hidden in the mix) and a bell like part created separately in Ableton Live.
The most time consuming part was to balance the music with the foley, but this will become more apparent once I’ve uploaded the video. Logic (and its auxes and buses) was being awkward too.
Credits:
Photograph: The Solent near sunset (@echosonic)
I give the director permission to use my music in the trailer for the film Sense the Wind for promotional purposes.
More on this 71st Disquiet Junto project, which involves creating a backing score for the trailer to the film Sense the Wind, about competitive blind sailing, directed by Christine Knowlton, at:disquiet.com/2013/05/09/disquiet0071-windmusic/
More details on the Disquiet Junto at: soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/info
More on the film at: www.sensethewind.com/
2 tones, 3 beats, 1 scary minute
Disquiet Junto Project 0070: 2 Tones, 3 Beats
This week’s project is a minimalist enterprise. It is an attempt to probe the place where beats and tones merge.
Instructions:
soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/info
Information:
A rather on-edge semitone interval (C and C#) predicated a fairly “unhappy” piece. The two tones were created from bass guitar and recorder. Each was looped and given a little distortion and granular delay respectively. There was much of an obvious pulse, so the rhythm is a bit more implied than actual. The hits were all derived from random percussive objects hit with the end of a drum stick: bass drum=pop shield, glass=”high hat”, leather wallet=midrange percussive hit)
Overall this was a fun task … I would have probably preferred the limitation of two concurrent tones over a longer period than two tones only over one minute.
Title/Tag: Include the term “disquiet0070-2tones3beats” in the title of your track, and as a tag for your track.
Credits:
More on this 70th Disquiet Junto project, which involves creating a single piece of music from two tones and three beats, at: disquiet.com/2013/05/02/disquiet0070-2tones3beats/
More details on the Disquiet Junto at: soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/info
Meta derivations …
Disquiet Junto Project 0068: deriv.deriv.cc
This is a shared-sample project with the detailed instructions provided at the following site: Groups – Disquiet-junto
Information:
Each of the three shared samples were run through Ambient v0.3 and I spent 20 minutes or so playing with the parameters to find some interesting textures. After this, the granular samples were imported into Ableton Live for some further sound design. Certain sections were then brought into Kontakt to create some unique instrumentation.
Once a rough palette of sound was created, I imported everything into Logic Pro for arrangement and mixing.
Credits:
Photograph: @echosonic - creases
More on this 68th Disquiet Junto project, the intent of which is to draw attention to the benefits of a Creative Commons license allowing for derivative works, at:disquiet.com/2013/04/18/disquiet0068-deriv/
This track is composed from material extracted from three pre-existing tracks (“The Find Beauty, Even in the Mundane,” “Immaterial Girl,” “Libertarian Entertainment Automaton”) by C. Reider, all of which were released on the album The Conjuncts on the deriv.cc netlabel, and were themselves derived from the following: “Garden City” and “Ventilation” from Tulse Hill by Hannah Marshall; “LichenWall” from Gardening by Steve Moyes; “Eighteen Events” from Not One Nor by Daniel Barbiero; “Awkward Customer” from [m2012/30-09] by Restive; “cues two three” and “cue six” from Cue Sheet by Sighup; “Sending Dreams to She Downstream” from Pocket Suite by He Can Jog; “The Palsgraf Scale” from Weights and Measures by Gurdonark; “Bonus Track” from Pale by Leo Bettinelli and Pol Nieva; “Haunted Grace” from Haunted Grace on SoundCloud by Jess Lemont a.k.a. Be A Waterwolf; “Ochiita” from Gently Annoying by Xesús Valle; and “Once More With Intellect” from [m2012/30-09] by Restive.
More details on the Disquiet Junto at: Groups – Disquiet-junto
Heather and Minerva: a sound project for National Poetry Month
Photo: Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division
Disquiet Junto Project 0067: Odyssey Machine
Track title (since the rules don’t allow a title): “Heather and Minerva”
This week’s project is an adaptation of the ongoing National Poetry Month project at SoundCloud. The Junto will, collectively, produce new fragments of The Odyssey of Homer. A die and access to text-to-speech software were required.
Instructions:
soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/info
Information:
Working through the instructions I ended up with the following from Book 6 of Homer’s Odyssey:
Minerva, Goddess dread,
That sight forbidding them, whose eyes she dimm’d
With darkness shed miraculous around
Her fav’rite Chief.
I went to NaturalReaders.com and found a voice that had acceptable intonation. I picked “Heather” from the US selection and used a slightly slower reading option. Nevertheless, it was in no way ideal. I also had to edit the text slightly to get it to read better without noticeable glitches and troubles with the translator’s use of frequent “contraction apostrophes”.
Once I’d used Soundflower to record the output of the audio section, I turned to Ambient v0.3 and started playing with the audio file created. Over a few minutes I was able to record some interesting beds for the text (and several I shall be using in other projects 
). Everything was then pulled together in Logic Pro and suitably trimmed and faded. I was looking to create a broad range of light and dark under the voice.
Credits:
Photo: Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division (from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Minerv…th-detail-1.jpeg)
This project was inspired by the National Poetry Month event at SoundCloud, more details on which here: soundcloud.com/groups/national-poetry-month-collaborations
The source text for this project is William Cowper’s translation of The Odyssey of Homer, available here: archive.org/stream/theodysseyof…4269gut/24269-0.txt
More on this 67th Disquiet Junto project at: disquiet.com/2013/04/11/disquie…67-odysseymachine/
More details on the Disquiet Junto at: Groups – Disquiet-junto
