J.S. Bach, from The Well-Tempered Clavier:
Prelude XXII
Fugue XXII - Worthing version
- Richmond version
Prelude and Fugue XXII - black screen version
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In the visual track for these music/films I was influenced by Richard Feynman's explorations of the mechanics of the refraction and reflection of light.
Some of the images may be used again in a different way with my music in a future music/film.
In the two versions (the Worthing and the Richmond version) my different visual approaches bring out different aspects of my transcriptions of the music by Bach, which is why I'm again making available a black screen version.
More details
___________________________________________________________________
16/04/2015
I had a great time last week, as a guest at the international School of Sound symposium at the South Bank, London. I was invited by Larry Sider, the originator of this extraordinary biennial gathering of filmmakers, composers, sound designers, foley artists.
It was good to meet delegates from other countries, several of whom had read Eisenstein on the Audiovisual, which was a delightful surprise. The new book Cinema and the Audiovisual Imagination was being sold at the daily bookstall, and a substantial extract from it, about Spike Lee's major film Do The Right Thing, was included in the selection of texts in the folder for the symposium.
This year the School of Sound was particularly stimulating, with the participation of the American composer Pauline Oliveiros, who spoke to us via skype from Troy, just north of Albany in New York State. She got the three hundred delegates to sing, to each hum a different note, then to stand and sing out glissandi. Both requests produced audible sub harmonic frequencies in the Purcell Room, reminiscent of the deep rumblings heard near giant waterfalls.
Another participant, the theatre and opera director Peter Sellars, spoke via skype from his home in Los Angeles. His very engaging talk about sound was so full of striking ideas that at times you forgot his presence - you were rapidly absorbing the new perspectives developing in front of you, before he went on to present yet another fresh and intriguing concept.
There was one delegate who stood out due to his unusual appearance. He explained to me that he was dressed in the full costume (with a four-pointed hat) of a shaman from the Sami people from northern Finland.
Ande Somby is a yoiker: he sings songs which express a distillation of the qualities of local animals, fish and insects. He told me that these songs are also used to express the nature of certain kinds of tree or plant, for example the waves in long grass stirred by the wind. He performed several yoiks, including an evocation of a wolf, with its uncannily echoing howls. Then, after a quiet moment in the song, he uttered an incredibly loud crunching sound which made everyone jump in their seats.
The yoiks are songs in which every register of the voice is used, including overtone singing. The creature depicted in a yoik is not only expressed in terms of the sounds it makes, but its movements are also transformed into music.
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Prelude XXII
Fugue XXII - Worthing version
- Richmond version
Prelude and Fugue XXII - black screen version
___________________________________________
In the visual track for these music/films I was influenced by Richard Feynman's explorations of the mechanics of the refraction and reflection of light.
Some of the images may be used again in a different way with my music in a future music/film.
In the two versions (the Worthing and the Richmond version) my different visual approaches bring out different aspects of my transcriptions of the music by Bach, which is why I'm again making available a black screen version.
More details
___________________________________________________________________
16/04/2015
I had a great time last week, as a guest at the international School of Sound symposium at the South Bank, London. I was invited by Larry Sider, the originator of this extraordinary biennial gathering of filmmakers, composers, sound designers, foley artists.
It was good to meet delegates from other countries, several of whom had read Eisenstein on the Audiovisual, which was a delightful surprise. The new book Cinema and the Audiovisual Imagination was being sold at the daily bookstall, and a substantial extract from it, about Spike Lee's major film Do The Right Thing, was included in the selection of texts in the folder for the symposium.
This year the School of Sound was particularly stimulating, with the participation of the American composer Pauline Oliveiros, who spoke to us via skype from Troy, just north of Albany in New York State. She got the three hundred delegates to sing, to each hum a different note, then to stand and sing out glissandi. Both requests produced audible sub harmonic frequencies in the Purcell Room, reminiscent of the deep rumblings heard near giant waterfalls.
Another participant, the theatre and opera director Peter Sellars, spoke via skype from his home in Los Angeles. His very engaging talk about sound was so full of striking ideas that at times you forgot his presence - you were rapidly absorbing the new perspectives developing in front of you, before he went on to present yet another fresh and intriguing concept.
There was one delegate who stood out due to his unusual appearance. He explained to me that he was dressed in the full costume (with a four-pointed hat) of a shaman from the Sami people from northern Finland.
Ande Somby is a yoiker: he sings songs which express a distillation of the qualities of local animals, fish and insects. He told me that these songs are also used to express the nature of certain kinds of tree or plant, for example the waves in long grass stirred by the wind. He performed several yoiks, including an evocation of a wolf, with its uncannily echoing howls. Then, after a quiet moment in the song, he uttered an incredibly loud crunching sound which made everyone jump in their seats.
The yoiks are songs in which every register of the voice is used, including overtone singing. The creature depicted in a yoik is not only expressed in terms of the sounds it makes, but its movements are also transformed into music.
__________________________________________________________________