A few entires back I posted links to two online articles. This is where I toss my musings into Internet tides so they’re not lost in chicken scratchings.
Zeynup Bulut – “The Problem of Archiving Sound Works”
This essay tapped into ethnomusicology, which is splendid. Not in an 1890’s lighthearted racist kind of way, but in tying my loose project ideas into the media practice of archiving. Bulut introduces and asks some essential questions that I find I’m capable of asking without bending over backwards. His last paragraph best reveals relevance:
Finally, where dos the archiving of sound works stand in this picture? Since the archive is not a type of silent storage, archiving a sound word cannot order and classify it. The goal should be neither to put sound works into wordy cages, nor installing silent shelves for sound works. Instead, the goal should be to provide a medium, a place where sound words can unfold and be encountered, a place where sonic experience is encourages, and a place where personal knowledge can be constructed.
Bulut, 2006:15
Bulut has plenty to say about the nature of archiving and how sound as data does/should fit in. There isn’t really any conclusive indication as to how sounds should be categorised, but rather what should be preserved in archiving them.
First thing’s first before getting into this: do not get preoccupied with phenomenology. Memo – done. This tangent helps to address my question of what exactly is being archived in my project, and what relationship between archiving and historicity I’m exploring.
For years, we often did phenomenology without knowing it, which is much better than talking about phenomenlogy without practicing it.
Schaeffer, Traite des objects musicaux (1966:262)
“Rather than look to empiricism to provide a solution, Husserl sought an objective, but non-empirical foundation for logic” (2). Delving into phenomenology informs how and why I intend on abstracting my sound objects. The idea is offered that ‘intentional’ objects are realised through a multiplicity of acts of consciousness.
Adumbrations (Abschattungen): stream of perspectival views
“The acousmatic experience reduces sounds to the field of hearing alone” (3). So I can’t really justify using images of sound sources immediately (ie. when testing on Videodefunct). Better yet: begin with heavily pixelated/abstracted visuals – gradually clear up to [v. briefly] reveal rapid edits of sound source stills (from different perspectives, keeping with the adumbrations) – abstract again / fade to black?
Modes (functions) of listening: comprendre, ecouter, ouir et entendre
“… entendre represents a mode of listening that actively selects, appreciates and responds to particular attributes of sounds.” (4)
“Many of the techniques developed for producing concrete works depend upon variation. The composer subjects pre-recorded sounds to filtration, editing, looping, reverberation, or changes in speed or direction. The results of such processes must be tested again within the sphere of listening, to determine whether these variations present us with ‘the same’ sound object, or new sound objects entirely. Each variation is an investigation into the objectivity of the sound object” (6)
Concentration tapering… wilt. So just to conclude, I think this second essay has been more useful in terms of thinking about my actual composition methodology. It’s provoked plenty of thoughts on how I might actualise and refine my practice and to remind myself again – don’t get caught up in phenomenology.
