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New Book review online

Listening to Places. Exercises Towards Environmental Composition - Robin Parmar. Derry (Northern Ireland): Void Gallery, 2022

Book review by Marcel Cobussen

SOUND ON SCREEN II - HYBRID CONFERENCE, OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY, 5th-6th JULY 2023 | CALL FOR PAPERS

DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS: FRIDAY 24th MARCH 2023 (23:59)

Please submit an abstract of no more than 300 words, an indication of whether you would prefer to appear in person or online, and a brief biography of no more than 150 words to soundonscreen@outlook.com by March 24th 2023.

The second Sound on Screen conference welcomes submissions for 20-minute papers from scholars and practitioners that explore the relationship between music and/or sound and the screen. We welcome submissions from speakers at any career stage (including postgraduate MA or PhD candidates) and from a wide range of disciplines such as musicology, film and television studies, cultural studies, communications studies and so forth. The first Sound on Screen conference invited participants to take their cue from Chion (1994) and Mera et al. (2017) in drawing together ‘different practices and technologies under the same umbrella without attempting to obfuscate the differences that exist between them’. This resulted in a diverse range of topics and speakers, and allowed us to create interdisciplinary panels that brought different fields and viewpoints into fruitful dialogue with each other. We intend the second Sound on Screen conference to continue this rich discussion and so in addition to inviting any relevant paper proposals, we particularly welcome submissions that engage with the interplay between sound and music on screen, and also considerations of equality, diversity and inclusion in relation to music and sound on screen. This conference will be held in person at our Headington campus in Oxford, but hybrid options will be available to presenters and delegates.

Topics might include, but are not limited to:

• Music and sound in narrative film and/or television
• Music and sound in documentary forms
• Music and sound in videogames
• The absence of music and sound in film and television
• The relationships between music and sound
• EDI and screen industries
• Gendered music on screen
• Music and sound in animated film and television
• Audience engagement with music and sound on screen
• Sound on screen as practice: composers and/or sound design
• Sound effects and/or noise on screen
• Pre-existing music and sound on screen

The programme committee may, at our discretion, extend the conference to three days if demand deems it appropriate. If your paper is accepted, we will provide the opportunity to select your preferred presentation day, including the potential third day.

The programme committee consists of Dr. Jan Butler (Senior Lecturer in Popular Music, Oxford Brookes University), Dr. James Cateridge (Senior Lecturer in Film, Oxford Brookes University), and Dr. Matt Lawson (Senior Lecturer in Music, Oxford Brookes University), and Dr. Lindsay Steenberg (Reader in Film Studies, Oxford Brookes University).

The Conference is organised with the support of the Centre of Research in the Arts (CoRA)
Further information can be requested by contacting soundonscreen@outlook.com
Details of the first Sound on Screen conference can be found at Sound on Screen 2021.

Polyphonic landscape - Save the date
ArtEZ Professorship Theory in the Arts in collaboration with Zone2Source (platform for art, nature, and technology in the Amstelpark, Amsterdam) are pleased to invite you to the online opening seminar of Polyphonic Landscapes on Thursday 16 March 2023, 12:00 – 17:00.

(Admission free, registration required: polyphoniclandscapes.artez.nl)

Polyphonic Landscapes is an artistic research programme on sound and ecology in which 4 international artists explore the Amstelpark during a series of residencies in the Park Studio:

• Budhaditya Chattopadhyay (IN/NL)
• Yolande Harris (UK/US)
• Teemu Lehmusruusu (FI)
• Lia Mazzari (IT/UK)

Their research will result in an exhibition in and outside Het Glazen Huis in the fall of 2023.

Online opening seminar

In this first seminar, the participating artist-researchers will present their projects, after which they will
engage in an interview with an assigned critical friend. Each session will conclude with a Q&A.

Programme for the day:
12.00 – 12.15 Word of introduction
12.15 – 13.15 Budhaditya Chattopadhyay in dialogue with Sharon Stewart
13.15 – 14.15 Teemu Lehmusruusu in dialogue with Alexandra Supper
14.15 – 14.45 Break
14.45 – 15.45 Yolande Harris in dialogue with Ximena Alarcón
15.45 – 16.45 Lia Mazzari in dialogue with Ximena Alarón

Zoom link will be sent in time after your registration.

Landscaping
A growing number of scientists, scholars and artists agree that we have entered the Anthropocene, a geological era in which humankind has become a major force in shaping the Earth. In this context the concept of landscape acquires a new urgency, as well as a new meaning: Where landscape historically has often been thought of as a picturesque vista or a passive backdrop for human protagonists, contemporary artists and theorists conceptualize landscape not so much as a noun but as a verb. The latter expresses a continuous flux of becoming in which both human and more-than-human agencies are entangled in a polyphony of 'world making', i.e., landscaping.

Listening as research
In the artistic research project Polyphonic Landscapes sound artists Budhaditya Chattopadhyay (IN, NL), Yolande Harris (UK, US), Teemu Lehmusruusu (FI) and Lia Mazzari (IT, UK) enquire into the question of how sound and the act of listening can contribute to a more active understanding of landscapes. In other words: How can our sense of hearing foster a more embodied, inclusive, relational, and reciprocal connectivity to our environment, the latter being ecologically understood as a process in which various life forms, materials, energy flows and temporalities are involved?

The underlying goal of the project is to gain more insight into how artistic research(-ers) produce new entrances to layers of knowledge that are not, or hardly, accessed by regular academic practices. The ways in which the artists give shape to their explorations and how they demonstrate the public aspects of research are an important point of focus.

Polyphonic Landscapes operates at three levels:

1. Sonic research into the urgent relation between nature and culture
2. Research into the agency of both theory and practice in artistic research
3. Research into the ecology of the senses and the multisensorial

Researchers and location
In Polyphonic Landscapes these questions will be explored by four internationally acclaimed sound artists. Their one-year-long artistic research will result into the creation of new sound works that facilitate embodied and situated ways of knowing and experiencing landscapes. To foster a fruitful cross-pollination between artistic practice and critical theory, researchers of the ArtEZ Professorship Theory in the Arts (led by Peter Sonderen, project leader Joep Christenhusz) and Zone2Source director Alice Smits will act as a theoretical sounding board, alongside other experts.

The artists will focus their research on the specific landscape of the fifty-year-old Amstelpark where Zone2Source is located. The Amstelpark, designed for the Floriade in 1972, is a hybrid environment in which the urban and natural are closely intertwined. The proceedings of their investigations will be shared during three public research seminars. To conclude the project, the connected sound works will be exhibited by Zone2Source from mid-September through mid-November 2023.

National Research Agenda (NWA)
Polyphonic Landscapes is part of the Art Route NWA-project Bit by bit, or not at all within the scheme ‘Small Projects’ which is financed by the Dutch Research Council (NWO). In this project several cluster questions will be addresses that were posed by the National Research Agenda. For instance: ‘What is quality of life?’ and ‘What does art mean to people?’.

Polyphonic Landscapes seeks to find new perspectives on these questions by means of artistic research that inquires after the relationship between nature and culture, and the position of the human and non-human in particular. It endorses the NWA Art Route’s view that, in the face of global climate breakdown, art can be an alternative way of knowledge production that sidesteps dichotomies between subject and object, knowing and experiencing, human and non-human, in the face of climate breakdown.

Journal of Sonic Studies: New issue online - Voice and Listening as Techniques for Political Life 

https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/558896/1937426

Guest Co-Editors: Fadia Dakka, Kirsten Forkert, Ed McKeon, Jill Robinson and Ian Sergeant 

Contributors:Ximena Alarcón-Díaz & Ed McKeon, Sarah Amsler, Kate Lacey, Sipho Ndlovu and Ryan Sinclair,  Rajni Shah, Rodrigo Toro and Donovan Hernández, and Tom Western.

We are launching today this special issue of the Journal of Sonic Studies on ‘Voice and Listening as Techniques for Political Life’: a forum for contributions across cultural studies, performance studies, political geography, social science, deep listening, sound art, and performance poetry.

When we staged our one-day symposium on this topic at Birmingham City University in March 2021, we were marking the anniversary of the UK’s first lockdown during the global pandemic. With tens of thousands of unnecessary deaths already recorded and unbearable strain on hospitals, doctors, and other public services, it felt urgently important to take time out with others to both gain a better understanding of the current situation as well as to discover strategies for action and renewal.

Perhaps it was the enforced isolation and withdrawal from public space that prompted our attention towards matters of voice and listening. Congregating with others had been restricted by law. Social media began to function as a kind of proxy or ersatz political arena, yet this mediation of everyday political practice brought with it a host of distortions. . As we know only too well, algorithms amplify some opinions and diminish others, demanding our prolonged attention with distractions, rage, and outrage.

We are grateful to the editors of the Journal for giving us this opportunity to pause and reflect further, to invite a global array of contributions, and to share this with a broader public. This is an urgent discussion to be had and we invite you to take part. In addition to reading and listening to the different pieces, do join us for our live hybrid launch event on Friday 10 March, 4-5:30pm GMT (face-to-face at BCU and online on Zoom). Communication is not a one-way street and we want to listen and hear your thoughts as well as to embrace practices of voicing and listening that reflect the values that this special issue is designed to promote.

Online: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/journal-of-studies-special-issue-launch-online-tickets-537829712147

In Person: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/journal-of-sonic-studies-special-issue-launch-in-person-tickets-537897364497

Assistant Professor in Sound Studies and Sound Art (0.2 FTE)

The Academy of Creative and Performing Arts (ACPA) is looking for a Assistant Professor in Sound Studies and Sound Art. ACPA is one of the seven institutes of Leiden University's Faculty of Humanities, and originated from a partnership with the University of the Arts The Hague. One of the new ACPA initiatives is to establish a Sound Studies Center which will concentrate on four key topics: the development of the discourse around sound; creating sound artworks; consultancy work on sound policies; education in and through auditory culture.

Key responsibilities
The new Assistant Professor will take on the following responsibilities commensurate with career stage:

• co-developing a newly established Sound Studies Center
• further developing the discourse on sound studies and sound art
• developing sound artworks and/or helping to facilitate sound art in and around Leiden
• stimulating the role of sound artists in the (re)designing of public (urban) places

Selection criteria
The candidate we are seeking:

• has a PhD in sound studies, sound art, or a field relevant for this position
• has a good overview of contemporary practices and discourses on sound and sound art
• has published on sound and sound art
• has demonstrable experience in organizing sonic events
• has experience in applying for grants and other forms of subsidies
• can act as a co-supervisor of PhD candidates in sound art/artistic research
• has good proficiency in English and preferable also the Dutch language
• is ultimately able and willing to teach a course on sound studies and sound art

Furthermore:

• Non-Dutch-speaking candidates will be required to acquire proficiency in Dutch to level B1 within two years of taking up the appointment. The candidate must demonstrate sufficient progress toward attaining this level of Dutch acquisition by the time of the probationary review. The institute facilitates Dutch-language learning with reimbursement of costs and teaching relief for an approved training programme;
• Upon appointment, depending on experience and formal qualifications, the successful applicant is required to obtain a nationally recognised University Teaching Qualification (BKO); the candidate must demonstrate sufficient progress toward the attainment of the BKO by the time of probationary review.

Our Faculty/Institute
The Faculty of Humanities has a wealth of expertise in fields of philosophy, history, art history, the arts, literature, linguistics, religious studies, and area studies of virtually the entire world. The Faculty offers staff and students from the Netherlands and abroad an inspiring international working environment and opportunities for diversity and innovation. The research at the Faculty is organised within seven institutes More detailed information can be found on the website of the Faculty of Humanities.

ACPA is a research institute of the Faculty of Humanities at Leiden University. In addition to research in and through the arts, ACPA offers academic education for art students in The Hague and art education for students at Leiden University. Furthermore, the institute organizes cultural events where art and academia meet. More information about ACPA can be found on its website.

Terms and conditions
We offer a part-time (0.2 FTE, 8 hours per week) post for the period of 18 months from 1 April 2023, or as soon as possible thereafter, with the possibility of a permanent contract conditional on performance and funding. Salary range, depending on training and experience, is from € 3.974,-  to € 5.439,-  (pay scale 11 in accordance with the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities) before tax per month, based on a full-time appointment.

Leiden University offers an attractive benefits package with additional holiday (8%) and end-of-year bonuses (8.3%), training and career development, and sabbatical leave. Our individual choices model offers some freedom to assemble a personalised set of terms and conditions. Candidates from outside the Netherlands may be eligible for a substantial tax break. There is a Dual Career Programme for international spouses; for further details, see https://www.medewerkers.universiteitleiden.nl/po/international-staff/social-life-and-settling-in/your-spouses-career---the-dual-career-programme-dcp.

New book reviews online

Kolonialgeschichte hören: Das Echo gewaltsamer Wissensproduktion in historischen Tondokumenten aus dem südlichen Afrika - Anette Hoffmann. Vienna: Mandelbaum Verlag, 2020

Listening After Nature. Field Recording, Ecology, Critical Practice - Mark Peter Wright. New York: Bloomsbury, 2022

Book reviews by Marcel Cobussen

1st CALL: III International Conference on Sonorities Research (CIPS) – Sounds of the end of the world

Dates: June 07, 2023 to June 09, 2023

Location: Fluminense Federal University – Niterói/RJ – Brazil

During the last decades, global changes that can be threats to human existence itself have emerged – threats caused by ourselves, as theories of the Anthropocene show. Climate change, pandemics, food shortage and wars are the result of brutal economic exploitation of the planet as well as struggles for the control of natural resources and the denial of the ongoing crisis of the planet.

The end of the world, of course, refers not just to nuclear or climate disasters, but also to the end of a worldview, models of knowledge or even cognitive, social or affective patterns. A new world emerges outlining its creative powers and its dystopias of control, automation and extraction of natural resources necessary for technological development.

How do sound and music cultures take part, articulate, face and/or politicize themselves in the face of late capitalism and the Anthropocene? What do certain sounds and certain songs teach us in the face of situations that don't seem to have any other alternative but to accelerate? Which sounds need to be heard, which are being ignored and which denounce the urgency of the end of the world? Last, but not least, what does it mean to listen to the end of the world? In this sense, the III International Conference on Sonorities Research (CIPS) - Sounds of the End of the World seeks to highlight the different sonorous aspects of our relationship with the world and with the transformations through which it has passed.

The III CIPS welcomes proposals for academic presentations and artistic performances. Some of the perspectives, but not the only ones, that interest this conference are:

1. Sound ecologies: Anthropocene, creation and entropy

2. Sound identities: Post-coloniality; Decoloniality; afro-futurisms; Amerindian Perspectivism

3. Technologies and production models: the late capitalism's sound project

4. Collective fear, emotions, media and music

5. Modes of listening, signs and sound affects in times of capitalist realism

6. Struggles, Resistances, Insurgencies: Sound, listening and survival in a world at risk

Submission of abstracts: until December 16, 2022

The 2nd call will soon be published with guidelines and e-mail for submissions.

Journal of Sonic Studies 23 online

The editors of the Journal of Sonic Studies are proud to announce that its 23th issue is online. This special issue of the Journal of Sonic Studies, edited by guest editor Diana Grgurić, brings together scholars and artists in exploring the acoustic culture of the Balkans. From a variety of theoretical perspectives broadly set in the interdisciplinary field of sonic studies, the authors contribute with articles of analytical and artistic provenance, investigating the sonic practices, their perceptions and memories, as well as the socio-political organization of music and sound in this specific geographical region in Europe.

Table of Contents:

Sounds of the Balkan – Editoria - lDiana Grgurić

Soundscapes of Stalinism: Acoustical Experiences in Bucharest in the 1940s and 1950s - Błażej Brzostek

A Spectral Geology - D.A. Calf

Listening against "The Transition" - Theodore Teichman

What is the Affect of a Merry Genre? The Sonic Organization of Slovenian Folk Pop as a (Non)Balkan Sound - Robert Bobnič, Natalija Majsova, and Jasmina Šepetavc

The Right to Polished Sound: Age and Class in the Viennese Balkan Music Scene - Ondřej Daniel

Contextualities of Listening to Soundscapes: The Past and The Present Converging in Sarajevo - Maja Zećo

Сарајево concrète - Lasse-Marc Riek

New book review online

Stereophonica: Sound and Space in Science, Technology, and the Arts - Gascia Ouzounian. MIT Press, 2021

Book review by Ezra J. Teboul

Online course in sound and audio offered by Barry Truax

Following two very successful previous versions of this course, Barry Truax is offering to mentor another group of participants in a 12 week online course in sound and audio, starting May 12 and going to July 28, 2022.

The course will be systematically going through the Tutorial associated with the Handbook for Acoustic Ecology located on the WSP Database, and covering two modules most weeks, one in acoustics, the other in electroacoustics. Meetings will be once a week on Zoom for 2-1/2 hours to discuss these topics, scheduled for 10:30 am – 1 pm PDT on Thursdays.

This course will be useful as professional development to those wanting to teach sound and audio, as well as graduate students and others who would like to broaden their knowledge across multiple disciplines. If anyone wants to take the course for academic credit, they need to set this up at their own institution.

The particular strengths (and challenges) of the Tutorial are the parallel modules in acoustics and electroacoustics that emphasize their often ignored links. Participants may be more experienced in one or the other areas, but this course should allow for imbalances in knowledge to be addressed.

The Tutorial and Handbook files will be downloaded by each individual for ease of access. The preferred browsers are Safari and Firefox (those with the Catalina OS and Chrome are likely to encounter problems). Additional software for experimentation will be made available.

The meeting time will be Thursday morning at 10:30 Pacific time, for North and South Americans, which will be the evening for those in Europe. Unfortunately, it’s doubtful that participants from other parts of the world would be able to participate as easily given the time differences; however, a Pacific Rim version with Susan Frykberg (who is based in Australia/NewZealand) may be available and will involve a modest fee (contact sfrykberg@gmail.com) if you are interested.

Those interested who have the time (you will probably need a minimum of 8 hours a week for study, apart from whatever time would be spent with the personal listening and studio experiments), please contact Barry Truax at truax@sfu.ca, also if you have any questions or would like to view the Tutorial in advance, which is recommended.

New release by Joseph Nechvatal

After having published the decades-spanning cassette retrospective Selected Sound Works (1981-2021) last year, on March 14, 2022, Pentiments is releasing here Joseph Nechvatal’s The Viral Tempest double vinyl LP and Bandcamp tracks. 

The audio on the first disk – made in collaboration with Andrew Deutsch – is OrlandO et la tempete viral symphOny redux suite. It uses an anonymous reading of Virginia Woolf's Orlando as a type of sonic signature that Nechvatal’s virus-modeled artificial life audio material reanimates. The second piece, pour finir avec le jugement de dieu viral symphOny plague, serves as a brother suite to the first and instead uses Antonin Artaud's controversial recorded performance of his radio play To Have Done with the Judgement of God as the sonic figure. 

The LP is in an edition 200 with a full color gatefold jacket, full color labels, an 11x11" 12-page full color exhibition catalog documenting the paintings featured in Nechvatal’s 2020 Orlando et la tempête art exhibition at Galerie Richard (Paris) and an 8.5x11” insert featuring an interview with him by S.K.G. Noise Admiration. 

New book review online

The Bloomsbury Handbook of Sonic Methodologies - Michael Bull and Marcel Cobussen. New York: Bloomsbury, 2020

Book review by Vincent Meelberg

ARC Session Sounding Sonic Materialism by Academy of Creative and Performing Arts - Leiden University

On December 6, 2021 Marcel Cobussen hosted a special event in Studio Loos in The Hague (the Netherlands) on Sonic Materialism. Featuring the American trombone player, theoretician, and instrument builder Kevin Fairbairn, the Welsh composer and improviser Richard Barrett, and the Argentinian sound artist and composer Gabriel Paiuk, the event was comprised of 3 lecture-performances (and a brief introduction by Cobussen), exploring how Sonic Materialism can sound, how sound as sound can contribute to a more theoretical discourse on (New) Materialism.

A registration of this event can be found here

New book review online

Podcasting: The Audio Media Revolution - Martin Spinelli and Lance Dann. New York: Bloomsbury, 2019

Book review by Jeremy Wade Morris

Free E-book | Negotiating Noise: Across places, spaces and disciplines

Negotiating Noise Across Places, Spaces and Disciplinesbrings together writing by 20 researchers from across Europe and South-East Asia on the slippery but fascinating topic of noise. What is noise, where can it be heard, and what should we do with it? These questions are answered in very different ways in this book from the perspectives of research in ar­chitecture, anthropology, cultural history and theory, ethno- and his­torical musicology, digital culture, linguistics, medicine, musical com­position, sociology, sound design, sound art, and urban planning. Drawing on transdisciplinary conversations at two workshops – one at Lund University and one at the University of Nottingham, Malaysia Campus – the book bridges professional as well as cultural divides. It sets out current research trajectories in the different disciplines involved in researching noise through a series of Position Papers. It also brings these perspectives together through a series of jointly authored Manifestos for the future.

The book can be downloaded via this link:

https://books.lub.lu.se/catalog/view/115/132/1287-1

Sonic Aggregator project by Tuned City and Soundtrackcity

Sonic Aggregator is a collaborative project of Tuned City and Soundtrackcity about ‘sonic placemaking’ hosted by ABA Air Berlin Alexanderplatz at Haus der Statistik in Berlin. With Peter Cusack, Vanessà Heer, Michiel Huijsman, Udo Noll. Sonic Aggregator has been long in the making and postponed several times due to covid measures, but finally this project is about to happen! The official opening is on 17 September. In the week thereafter presentations, workshops, soundwalks and a salon are open to the public. Have a look at the programme make reservations!

opening Sonic Aggregator: Friday 17. September 17:00
AIR Berlin Alexanderplatz, Haus der Statistik 
Otto-Braun-Straße 70-72
Berlin, 10178 Germany

The opening of Sonic Aggregator is part of ABA Air Berlin Alexanderplatz programme on Berlin Art Week 2021.

Sonic Aggregator is financially supported by Creative Industries Fund NL and the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

Who has the right to decide how our urban environment should sound?

This question is at the heart of the Sonic Aggregator project, in which everyone is invited to research the sound environment of HAUS DER STATISTIK from 17 to 27 September and speculate on the sounds of the future city. How does it sound now? How should it sound? Who or what determines that?

To enable this research and speculation we will install the listening art object Sonic Aggregator on site. The object - a modular, sculptural installation - invites people to linger, listen and interact, transporting and conveying the idea of urban sound, like a kind of Trojan horse, directly in the urban environment. While sitting in the object's acoustically perfected semi-open sound space, visitors can virtually navigate through a defined part of the city via touchscreen and immerse themselves in the respective sound worlds.

Free online course in sound and audio this fall offered by Barry Truax

Following a very successful summer version of this course, I am offering to mentor another group of participants in a 12 week online course in sound and audio, starting around Sept. 9 and going to Nov. 25.

We will be systematically going through the Tutorial associated with the Handbook for Acoustic Ecology located on the WSP Database, and covering two modules most weeks, one in acoustics, the other in electroacoustics. We’ll meet once a week on Zoom for 2-1/2 hours to discuss these topics.

This course will be useful as professional development to those wanting to teach sound and audio, as well as graduate students and others who would like to broaden their knowledge across multiple disciplines. If anyone wants to take the course for academic credit, they need to set this up at their own institution.

The particular strengths (and challenges) of the Tutorial are the parallel modules in acoustics and electroacoustics that emphasize their often ignored links. I would expect participants to be more experienced in one or the other areas, but this course should allow for imbalances in knowledge to be addressed.

The Tutorial and Handbook files will be downloaded by each individual for ease of access. The preferred browsers are Safari and Firefox (those with the Catalina OS and Chrome are likely to encounter problems). Additional software for experimentation will be made available.

A meeting time will be arranged to suit the participants, but it will likely be Thursday morning at 10:30 Pacific time, for North and South Americans, which will be the evening for those in Europe. Unfortunately, it’s doubtful that participants from other parts of the world would be able to participate as easily given the time differences; however, a Pacific Rim version with Susan Frykberg is also being planned.

Those interested who have the time (I estimate you will need a minimum of 8 hours a week for study, apart from whatever time would be spent with the personal listening and studio experiments), please contact me at truax@sfu.ca, also if you have any questions or would like to view the Tutorial in advance.

Here’s some of the feedback from the summer version of the course:

[The course] was an invaluable experience for me, and I really am grateful for the opportunity

… there's *a lot* to (re)learn and review from the Handbook and the Tutorials

The course completely changed my understanding of sound and my relation to it.

It was a great experience and it refreshed knowledge and brought new one, and I enjoyed the huge and important research you have put together.

It really allowed a lot of concepts that I vaguely understood to solidify and gain clarity, and it also revealed many ideas and phenomena that I was really clueless about. The information on the electroacoustic side of things really helped me understand things that I aurally understood, but never technically really grasped. It's given me a lot more confidence to tackle processing and effects.

Barry Truax

Professor Emeritus

Simon Fraser University

HOME AND COVID-19: Dwelling and belonging in pandemic times - CALL FOR PAPERS AND CREATIVE RESPONSES

A two-day symposium, 24 - 25 November 2021

The Museum of the Home, London, and online 

How has home changed during the COVID-19 pandemic? 

How have people experienced home in different and unequal ways? 

How could home change for the better in a post-pandemic future?

Researchers, artists, curators, community workers, faith leaders and others are invited to submit proposals for 20-minute papers on, and creative responses to, Home and COVID-19 for a two-day symposium at the Museum of the Home, London. 

We welcome proposals that consider home in different places and contexts, and in a multiplicity of ways, including: domestic spaces and practices; home and belonging in relation to the neighbourhood, city, nation and/or diaspora; home, dwelling and (im)mobility; home as embodied, sensory, emotional and material; and home as a site of inclusion, exclusion and inequality.  

The symposium is convened by the Stay Home Stories project (@stayhomestories), funded by the AHRC as part of the UKRI rapid response to COVID-19. The event will include the opportunity to view artist Alaa Alsaraji’s room installation on Home and COVID-19 and material collected as part of the Museum’s Stay Home rapid response collecting project.

Proposals are invited on any aspect of Home and COVID-19. We welcome paper proposals and creative responses in a variety of forms. Some sessions will focus on key themes addressed by the Stay Home Stories project, including:  

• The politics of home
• Home, migration and ethnicity
• Home, religion and interfaith work
• Home, children and young people
• Creative and curatorial practice
• Home, connection and disconnection
•  

Please submit proposals of up to 200 words and biographies of up to 100 words by 17 September 2021 to Dr Miri Lawrence (m.lawrence@qmul.ac.uk). The programme will be confirmed in early October.

Nameless: 20 Years of Sound Edition - Pauline Oliveros is Live

Explore the archive of Nameless Sound through never-before-released audio, video performances, and other ephemera from the 20-year vault. We are very proud to present our fourth edition, which focuses on Houston’s own composer, accordionist, humanitarian and the creator of Deep Listening ®, Pauline Oliveros.

Pauline Oliveros came to know future Nameless Sound Founding Director David Dove through her mother Edith Gutierrez, who worked with Dove as a telemarketer at The Houston Ballet. Over several years, an informal mentorship developed. Eventually, Oliveros invited Dove to start a branch of her Deep Listening Institute (originally named the Pauline Oliveros Foundation) in Houston. In 2001, The Pauline Oliveros Foundation Houston began operations. In 2006, we decided to branch off and form the independent non-profit organization, Nameless Sound.

The Pauline Oliveros edition explores the relationship between Oliveros and the Houston organization she encouraged, mentored and inspired. Ten never-before-released audio and video recordings feature performances of Oliveros’ scores as well as concerts by Oliveros with Susie Ibarra, Susan Alcorn, Maria Chavez, Tom Bickley, David Dove, Sandy Ewen, Chris Cogburn, and Ricardo Arias, among others. Written essays on Oliveros and Nameless Sound by Ione, Maria Chavez, Ricardo Arias and David Dove. To the history of the future.

Keep listening and explore our archive with editions featuring Joe McPhee, Maggie Nicols, and Alvin Fielder, at Nameless: 20 Years of Sound.

The Listening Biennial July 15 – August 1, 2021

Errant Sound, Rungestrasse 20 10179 Berlin, plus participating institutions, venues, and collectives

www.listeningbiennial.net

Within today’s intensely polarized environment, in which political and social debate often tend toward conflict or impasse, might listening enact an intervention? While focus is often placed on making statements, capturing history, and the importance of free speech, listening is radically key to facilitating dialogue, understanding, and social transformation. To listen is to extend the boundaries of the familiar, the recognized, and the known. In addition, listening affords more egalitarian, decolonized, and ecologically-attuned relations, staggering exclusionary systems and human exceptionalism by way of empathetic, attentional, and morethan-human orientations: to hear beyond the often fixed schema of self and other. Listening is a power, it may open and hold, it may support and attend, and it may afford escape and deep friendship. And yet listening is greatly undervalued and neglected across society.

The Listening Biennial draws attention to listening as a relational capacity, a philosophical and political proposition, a creative practice, and research framework. From radical empathy to weak ontology, poetic refusal to diasporic resistance, eavesdropping to intimate envelopment, listening wields a creative and critical force that may contribute to maintaining the diversity of our social adventure.

The Listening Biennial brings together an international group of participating artists, musicians, and researchers, as well as institutions and collectives across the globe, to foster questions and experiences of listening. The Listening Biennial is conceived as a global project and aims at a curatorial construct of shared resonances and polyvocal manifestations. This includes the exhibition of audio works, experimental performances, and discursive events presented across a constellation of collaborating institutions and venues, where listening and locality are accentuated, and cultural specificities contribute to a greater ecology of attention. From critical storytelling, experimental noise, and musical rapture to acoustic care, interspecies contact, and environments of sounded matter, the Biennial aims at fostering a listening world.

Participating artists:

Octavio Aguilar & Diego Martínez Guillén (Mexico), Khyam Allami (Iraq/UK), Jasmina AlQaisi (Romania/Germany), Carlos Amorales (Mexico), Wah-yan Au (Hong Kong), Tania Candiani & Bárbara Lázara (Mexico), Antoine Chessex & Mélia Roger (Switzerland/France), Michele Chu (Hong Kong), Bidisha Das (India), Yannick Dauby (France/Taiwan), Emcsi (Hungary), Yolande Harris (UK/US), Jeph Jerman (US), Khaled Kaddal (Egypt), Orsolya Kaincz (Hungary), Nandita Kumar & Joseph Kamaru (India/Kenya), Isuru Kumarasinghe & Sara Mikolai (Sri Lanka), Sharon Lee (Hong Kong), Sandra Monterroso & Manuel Estrella Chí (Guatemala/Mexico), Ziad Moukarzel (Lebanon), Alecia Neo (Singapore), Angel Nevarez & Valerie Tevere (US), Daniela Medina Poch (Colombia/Germany), Surabhi Saraf (India/US), Mene Savasta (Argentina), Wantanee Siripattananuntakul (Thailand), Ish Sherawat (India), Fernando Vigueras (Mexico), Raheleh (Minoosh) Zoromodinia (Iran/US).

Participating organizations, venues, and collectives:

Errant Sound, Berlin / Ayer, Guadalajara / National Arts Festival, Makhanda / Aerial, Bergen / Space21, Kurdistan / École d’art Université Laval, Quebec City / Liquid Architecture, Melbourne / AMEE, Madrid / Klank.ist, Istanbul / Culture Monks, Kolkata / TAFMA, Nagaland / Investigaciones del Futuro, Buenos Aires / Generator Projects, Dundee / Noise N’ Roses, Budapest / 1983, Hong Kong / The Cube Project Space, Taipei

A related performance and discourse program is presented at Errant Sound, Berlin, on July 21st, 24th, 26st, and 31st, featuring local and international artists and scholars working through a range of approaches and topics, including Mladen Dolar and Salomé Voegelin. This includes the launch of The Listening Academy, an intensive research workshop on listening, sonic practices, and sound studies, occurring simultaneously in Berlin and London, and led by Budhaditya Chattopadhyay, Lucia Farinati, Brandon LaBelle, and Carla J. Maier with Rayya Badran and Luz Maria Sanchez.

The Listening Biennial Founding initiator: Brandon LaBelle Curators: Budhaditya Chattopadhyay, Brandon LaBelle, Israel Martínez, Yang Yeung Collaborative partners: Florencia Curci, Hardi Kurda, Gentian Meikleham, Alexandre StOnge, Lucia Udvardyova, James Webb Design: fliegende Teilchen, Berlin; Kristin Rosch

Support from: Oficina de Autonomia; Norwegian Artistic Research Programme / The Art Academy, Bergen; Errant Sound, Berlin; Errant Bodies Press, Berlin.

Call for Papers - Echoes of a Distance: Music, Protest and Community in Confined Times

How can sound and music participate in protest without access to the streets and spaces of collective music creation? How does a collective sound when there is no actual gathering possible? Alternatively, when social movements take to the streets or occupy a territory despite public health regulations – as has happened on many occasions around the globe since the beginning of the pandemic (Black Lives Matter, Wet’suwet’en resistance, Belarus, Poland, Chile, Myanmar, The Netherlands, to mention only few) – what has changed on a sonic level? How can sound and music testify to the ways our current isolation has affected our capacity to collectively organize? And in this context, what can sound-based practices grounded in improvisation bring to the ongoing social and political struggles?

In order to understand the political impact of the potentialities opened up by music creation in times of curfews and restrictions on the assembly of physical bodies, the International Institute of Critical Studies in Improvisation (IICSI) at McGill University invites researchers and creators to contribute to two days of study November 19-20, 2021.

There is a growing interest in the relations between music, sound and social resistance in varied artistic, academic and activist milieus (Fischlin & Heble 2020, Gendron-Blais 2020, Labelle 2018, Rector & Ernest 2017, Born, Lewis & Straw 2017, DeLaurenti 2016). But the eruption of the pandemic has shaken many of the assumptions underlying these relations. This international online event aims to address how our new global situation is affecting how sound and social resistance relate.

We conceive of music, protest and community very widely, and accordingly think of this event as a meeting point for artists, activists and academics to reflect and share perspectives on these issues. Potential topics of research may include, but are not limited to:

• Social impacts of the strategies of collective music creation during lockdown;

• Sonic dimension of demonstrations in the COVID-era;

• Music creation inspired by/related to social movements in times of confinement;

• Political significance of soundscapes emptied of their human presences;

• Telematic performances motivated by social and political struggles;

• Affective dimensions of imposed distancing, on a sonic and political level;

• The transformation of the perceptual modalities of sound in relation to the pandemic;

Following the interdisciplinary mission of IICSI, the event welcomes conventional textbased communications, research-creation projects, performances and artworks of various forms, and various hybrid propositions between these poles. Proposals (in English or in French) should include a short bio (250 words max.) and an abstract and/or a presentation of the artistic project (500 words max). Any project that does not only include text-based presentations should also provide links giving access to excerpts of the work to be presented (or, if the proposed work have not been presented yet, to previous work in a similar media). Please include the proposed duration of your contribution, recognizing that there will be limited time for the whole event, and that we hope to minimize “Zoom burnout” on the part of participants and attendees.

Deadline for proposal: May 28

Proposals should be sent by email to Eric Lewis (eric.lewis@mcgill.ca) and Hubert Gendron-Blais (hubert.gendron-blais@mail.mcgill.ca), with the mention “Echoes of a Distance” in the title.

Note: If public health guidelines and related logistical concerns allow, there may be the possibility of having some live presentations.

Call for Papers: 2nd International Conference on Sonorities Research – CIPS

We invite researchers from all areas to submit proposals for the 2nd International Conference on Sonorities Research – CIPSto be held online between June 9 and 11, 2021. Just as its first edition, the second CIPS encourages the integration of different fields of knowledge related to sound and its practices.

The theme of this edition is “Borderline Sonorities,” which emphasizes the different relations between both musical and sound practices assimilated and crystallized in different social, political and historical contexts, as well as practices that, by many reasons, are either excluded or considered secondary within the current globalized model of mediatic production and circulation.

The six working groups (WG/GT) aim at comprising different perspectives: the relation between sounds and spaces; the different uses of technology; decolonial, feminist, non humanist perspectives etc.

This edition, exceptionally, will be held online due to the current worldwide health conditions.

Each WG is proposed and organized by researchers of different institutions from Brazil, Portugal and Canada.

A specific call for artistic works/presentations will be soon announced, just as in the first edition, but this time adapted for the online format.

ABSTRACT SUBMISSION Abstracts must be submitted by March 31 to the email cips.sonoridades@gmail.com in .doc (or .docx) formats, stating in the subject of the email “II CIPS”, followed by the intended WG (the indication of the WG in the “subject” field is mandatory).

The abstract must be formatted in Times New Roman font, Body 12, spacing 1.5. The file must contain, in this order:

● Proposal title;

● Authors and their respective e-mails and institutional affiliation (or main activity);

● Summary of up to 500 words;

● Three to five keywords;

● Intended WG.

Abstracts can be sent in Portuguese, Spanish or English. Some WG will conduct moderation in only two of these languages, but this is indicated in the group's description.

Visit the website www.sonoridades.net or follow our next circulars for more information.

New Book review online

The Political Possibility of Sound: Fragments of Listening - Salomé Voegelin. New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2019

Reviewed by Sharon Stewart

Nameless Sound, Houston-based presenter of experimental music and community arts programs celebrates its 20-year history through an exclusive release of their online archive project, Nameless: 20 Years of Sound

Starting on January 25, in commemoration of its 20th anniversary,  Nameless Sound will embark on the yearlong project   Nameless: 20 Years of Sound. Through monthly editions, the online exploration of Nameless Sound’s history will offer a wealth of new writing and archival materials. On the 4th Monday of every month, a new edition will feature a particular theme or an artist who has left a sonic and social imprint on the networks of Nameless Sound audiences, musicians, and youth. Editions will be posted to Nameless Sound’s website at www.namelesssound.org. Many music fans are likely to be drawn to this project for its abundance of rare audio and never-before-seen video featuring some of the most important names in experimental music including Pauline Oliveros, Joe McPhee, Roscoe Mitchell, Wadada Leo Smith, Maggie Nicols, Susie Ibarra, Susan Alcorn, and Loren Connors among others.  Nameless: 20 Years of Sound will also provide rare glimpses into Creative Music Communities, Nameless Sound’s pioneering workshop program that engages youth through music improvisation in Houston public schools, homeless shelters, refugee programs and community centers. The mission of Nameless Sound is to present the best of international contemporary music and to support the exploration of new methods in arts education.

On January 25, we commence the project with a spotlight on Joe McPhee. The saxophonist and trumpet player is one of the most beloved voices in creative music. Known for his expressive and ecstatic sound that extends directly from the human voice, McPhee is also known for a generous and open mind that is not afraid to experiment outside of idiom or convention. McPhee has inspired Houston listeners since his first performance in the city with Arthur Doyle in 1998 (the first ever concert presented by Nameless Sound Founding Director David Dove). In 2005, McPhee was the inaugural recipient of Nameless Sound’s Resounding Vision Award. In 2010, he and John Butcher were the first musicians Nameless Sound presented at The Hill of James Magee, the enigmatic art installation constructed in a remote area of the West Texas desert. In 2017, he performed for the memorial and birthday concert for composer and Nameless Sound mentor Pauline Oliveros. In between all of that, he blew through town for a range performances and projects, including engagements with the youth in Nameless Sound’s community programs. On January 25, we invite you to journey with us through the reflections and resonances of Joe McPhee’s Houston encounters. 

Nameless Sound Founding Director David Dove, “Since our founding, Nameless Sound has been focused on a unique program of creative and experimental listening and sounding experiences for a range of communities as diverse as Houston itself. Though Nameless Sound is one of the only consistent regional presenters of this music and is distinct nationally for its community programs, we have flown under the radar of wider attention from international fans and press. I hope that this project will not only provide a treasure trove of archival media for fans who love the music. But I also hope that it can help to share the story of a generation of listeners and soundmakers from the US’s most diverse city, and the visiting artists who have left their mark on those listeners and helped to cultivate those soundmakers.”  

About Nameless Sound

Nameless Sound began in 2001 in Houston as a branch of the Pauline Oliveros Foundation (now Deep Listening Institute), then formed its own independent non-profit organization in 2006. A concert presenter of experimental music, improvisation, jazz, and sound art, Nameless Sound is unique for the community-based projects that make up the foundation of the organization. In addition to introducing Houston audiences to many of the most influential international names in experimental music, Nameless Sound has designed and implemented a far-reaching workshop program that employs a pedagogy of music improvisation to serve youth in a wide range of Houston sites. Nameless Sound’s open youth workshop at MECA (an after-school arts program) has helped to cultivate a generation of Houston experimental musicians such as abstract turntablist and sound artist Maria Chavez, rapper and member of The Young Mothers, Jawwaad Taylor, guitar experimentalist Sandy Ewen, and many more. Nameless Sound has been the recipient of awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, The Brown Foundation, The Simmons Foundation, The Joan Hohlt and Roger Wich Foundation, Texas Commission for the Arts, Houston Arts Alliance, Houston Endowment, and the BMI Foundation.

For more on Nameless Sound’s history, go to  https://www.namelesssound.org/about/history.

Journal of Sonic Studies 20 online

JSS 20 is delighted to offer you eight exhibitions, a small cross-section of current research taking place in sound studies. In this issue, the reader can explore the sound worlds of the Baschet brothers’ Odontophones or follow an (embodied) investigation of the textured sound fields of Éliane Radigue’s sonic works. 

Take the sharply hooked turns to the Source Bleue in Tiznit, Morocco, and experience the sonic thresholds that gently mark or guide your experience. Ponder the tragic disruptions of Birdstrike through an audio documentary by Jacob Smith or be confronted with the use of noise and silence as powerful tools of disruption or coercion in the sound sculptures of Adam Basanta.

Take a guess at what lies within Marcel Duchamp’s With Hidden Noise (1916) or observe the physiological effects of durational listening to the sounds of Arctic winter winds featured on YouTube.

Finally, and perhaps most pertinent to our current situation, our readers can also consider the suggestions of Braxton Boren on how we might reduce low frequency noise transmission to our neighbours in adjacent apartment units. Perhaps with a few modifications, we can ease the sonic disturbances within this strange version of “living together apart” and improve the overall sonic liveability for all those living and working at home in close quarters.

Table of Contents and contributors to JSS20:

• Marcel Cobussen – “Editorial: Enjoy Sound Art and Sound Studies at Home During Hard Times”
• Martí Ruiz i Carulla and Sudhanshu Tewari – “Odontophones: An Empirical Approach to the Baschet Use of Clamped Oscillators for Sound Sculptures (and Beyond)”
• Mark Saccomano – “The Timbre of Tone, the Texture of Space: An Embodied Approach to the Atmospheric Modulations of Éliane Radigue” 
• Noha Gamal Saïd – “Sonic Affordances of a Sacred Spring. The Urban Courtyard as a Figure of Rehabilitation of the Medina”
• Jacob Smith – “The Pteropoetics of Birdstrike”
• Shauna Jean Doherty – “Noise and Silence: The Contemporary Sound Sculptures of Adam Basanta”
• Krzysztof Fijalkowski  – “Secret Noise: Marcel Duchamp and the (Un)sound Object”
• Braxton Boren – “The Soundscape of Quarantine: The Role of Sound During a Public Health Crisis”
• Svein Høier and Asbjørn Tiller – “Experiencing Recorded Geophony. Listening to Arctic Winter Winds at Home”

Online Tutorial for sound terminology, theory and practice, across multiple disciplines by Barry Truax

Below is a message from Barry Truax:

I am delighted to announce completion of my comprehensive online Tutorial for sound terminology, theory and practice, across multiple disciplines, that I hope will be of interest to those of you contemplating online teaching this coming academic year.

The Tutorial is designed to function in parallel with the Handbook for Acoustic Ecology, for which I’ve been editor since the 1970s. It is organized into 20 self-contained (but heavily cross-referenced) modules, half in the area of acoustic sound (focusing on acoustics, psychoacoustics, environmental acoustics, speech acoustics, audiology, noise measurement and soundscape studies), the other half in electroacoustics including studio based composition and sound design (and convolution, microsound, voice-based and soundscape composition). In the past, I have spread this material over two courses, but I believe that students in each area need to know at least some of the material in the other.

I have been teaching this material for over 45 years and have accumulated a large resource base that I would like to share with the community. Each module includes graphics, sound examples, video demonstrations, links to the Handbook, a review quiz in multiple choice, true/false format, some intriguing sidebars, and many personal listening and studio experiments for students to try.

The statistics are: 20 teaching modules, 3 indexes, over 550 .wav soundfiles, over 700 graphics including many spectrograms, 20 videos, 50 demo’s, exercises and experiments, 15 sidebars with some rather unique material, and 16 quizzes (with 740 answers). Along with the Handbook folder, the size of the Tutorial is now at 4.5 Gb.

The target audience is 3^rd and 4^th year undergraduates, as well as any graduates or others who have not had a solid foundation in the area.

The Tutorial is created with HTML5 Audio and is designed for Safari or Firefox as a browser given the formats being used. There is now a link to the Tutorial on the index page of the WSP Database that you can access using this url (contact me if you don’t have the guest password):

https://www.sfu.ca/sonic-studio/WSPDatabase/

For individual use, it will stay in this location, but for use in classes, I’m planning on making it a download directly to the Instructor. Of course everything is negotiable, but it would probably make the most sense to have a licensing arrangement with your school for its use. The SFU server is not ideal for group access as it’s not on a secure site here.

Feel free to send queries or comments.

All the best

Barry Truax (truax@sfu.ca) 

Website: www.sfu.ca/~truax

OPEN CALL: Artist Residency Programme at the Spatial Sound Institute

There are less than two weeks left to submit applications for the Artist Residency Programme 2021 at the Spatial Sound Institute.

This year’s focus is on the development of new pedagogical approaches that make use of spatial sound technologies and listening-based practices, thus proposals addressing these topics will be given priority in the evaluation process.

The programme is open to participants from various disciplines and at various stages of their artistic or scientific career.

• Read more about the call for proposals and how to apply here.
• Read the preamble to this year’s programme here.
• Apply online or request an offline package here.

Closing date for applications: 31 August 2020.

Open Call for (Audio) Moves: SONOHR

Movement is visible, palpable, a full-body experience. Movement is political, artistic, social. We look to movement to relax and we get uneasy when our world of movement is restricted. Where does the power to move come from? And what about the power to stand still? How do we feel when our freedom of movement is indefinitely restricted? Or when we have to move, even if we don’t want to? Audio is a disembodied medium that leads us through imaginary spaces. Our festival aims to demonstrate the varied ways movement can be translated into sound in terms of content, tone, format and imagery. The question we’re asking is: how does audio move (us)? The SONOHR Radio & Podcast Festival from 26 to 28 February 2021 is looking for program ideas that usher movement into our theatre or that put people in motion in public spaces.

• Audio pieces up to 20 minutes max.
• Live formats such as performances, interactive session, live podcasts up to 60 minutes max.
• Innovative formats, audio- and soundwalks, audio games or similar layouts that can either be experienced regardless of location or are flexible enough to be adapted to Bern

The festival offers remuneration for your performance and compensation for the playback of chosen audio pieces and program sessions. Generally speaking, productions cannot be co-financed in their entirety, but small production contributions, such as for the adaptation of an existing audiowalk, is possible.

WHO IS THE OPEN CALL AIMED AT?

At producers and authors of audio pieces, radio features, podcasts or audio art, at sound researchers, trainers or inventors of rich, new sound formats. This year the festival is particularly addressing those submitting from Switzerland and other European countries where their national languages are spoken (e.g. Belgium, Germany, France, Italy, Luxembourg, Austria). Entries in languages other than German, French, Italian and English can only be submitted with an English or German script. The correspondence language is English.

ENTRY FORM

ENTRY DEADLINE: AUGUST 3, 2020

In addition to this open call, in June 2020, SONOHR will announce the yearly competition for contemporary Swiss radio plays from freelance authors and private radio stations. The festival will take place from 26 to 28 February 2021 in the REX cinema in Bern.

QUESTIONS? info@sonohr.ch

JSS Call for Papers: Sound Studies, Soundscapes, and Sound Art of the Balkans

City sounds and sounds of nature; sounds of progress and nostalgic sounds; sounds of revolution and change, and sounds of restauration; sounds deliberately produced or emerging unintentionally, serving a disciplinary function or expressing forms of freedom; musical as well as non-musical (functional) sounds; sounds of war and sounds of friendship. 

How do the Balkans sound? How can their sonic ambiances be characterized? What can be heard there? How should we listen to them, experience them, affect and be affected by them? What is their political, social, religious, ethical, economic, aesthetic influence or meaning? How do Balkan sound artists respond to these influences and meanings? How are sound studies developing in South-Eastern Europe? 

The Journal of Sonic Studies is searching for scholarly and artistic contributions that deal with the connections and relationships between the history, culture, society, and politics of the Balkan countries and the production, distribution, and reception of sounds, noises, and silence. The broader aim of this special issue is to establish “sound” as an analytical category that provides us with challenging perspectives on and a new understanding of this part of Europe. Therefore, our call does not focus on a particular historical period or research methodology, but seeks to bring together scholars and artist-researchers who share an interest in Balkan sound studies, soundscapes, and/or sound art. 

Themes for submission may include but are not limited to:

-       The sonic identity of any Balkan space

-       Differences between various Balkan soundscapes or differences with West-European soundscapes

-       Balkan (contemporary) sound art

-       The role, position, and function of music in contemporary South-East European societies

-       Sonic histories of the Balkans

-       Listening cultures of Balkan countries 

-       Politics of sounds or the sounds of politics in the Balkans

-       The role of silence in Balkan societies and/or discourses

-       The role of sounds in Balkan religious practices

-       Rural “versus” urban soundscapes in Balkan countries

Guest editor

The Croatian musicologist Diana Grguric will act as guest editor of this special issue. 

Deadline

Potential contributors are invited to submit completed essays by January 10, 2021.

For more information, or to submit an “exposition”, please contact Marcel Cobussen (MA.Cobussen@hum.leidenuniv.nl) and/or Diana Grguric (dgrguric@ffri.hr)

New book review online

Gallery Sound - Caleb Kelly. New York: Bloomsbury, 2017

Reviewed by Zeynep Bulut

New book review online

Voicetracks: Attuning to Voice in Media and the Arts - Norie Neumark. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press 2017.

Reviewed by Vincent Meelberg

ARTIST RESIDENCY PROGRAMME 2021: OPEN CALL

Call Soundtrackcity

How do you experience a quieter city? (or A Silenced city?)

Cities normally filled with noise. The corona crisis has changed that. Few or no people on the streets, shops closed, much less traffic, hardly any planes coming over. The soundscape of the city has completely changed. Soundtrackcity, the organization behind Urban Sound Lab, therefore makes a worldwide appeal: How does the city sound in times of corona?

Share your sound impression with Soundtrackcity

How do you experience the quieter city? What do you hear? We’re curious – because not everyone hears the same. Share a description of what you hear in an email to info@urbansoundlab.nl. You can make it as long or short as you like.

We ask you to write something about the effects of the new soundscape on your wellbeing, on your health, on your mood, on your social life. What has changed? How does it feel? What is pleasant / unpleasant? What sounds are you missing? And: How should the city sound in the future?

Response and context of the call

Why is Soundtrackcity making this call? Right at the start of the crisis, we at Soundtrackcity realized that it is valuable to collect material that represents this unusual time. We decided not only to register current urban sound by making audio recordings but also and foremost to collect the impressions that the acutely changed soundscape has on the inhabitants of cities.

This call from Soundtrackcity is an encouragement to listen attentively to the urban environment now and to see what new insights this gives us. Insights that can lead to building a more just city. The more people listen the better, feel free to send the link to this call to your friends and acquaintances.

Every week we place an anthology of the entries in our Urban Sound Lab.

https://urbansoundlab.nl/oproep-hoe-klinkt-de-stad-in-tijden-van-corona/

How a city sounds is important as well (in Dutch)

Artist impressions tonen hoe een project eruitziet, plannen maken duidelijk wat de afmetingen zijn. Maar waarom houden we zo weinig rekening met hoe een gebiedsontwikkeling gaat klinken? Marcel Cobussen (hoogleraar auditieve cultuur, muziekfilosofie aan de Universiteit Leiden en founding editor van JSS) en Irene van Kamp (RIVM-onderzoeker omgevingsgeluid en gezondheid) bespreken de kansen die juist Nederlandse steden op dat vlak laten liggen.

https://www.gebiedsontwikkeling.nu/artikelen/hoe-een-stad-klinkt-%C3%B3%C3%B3k-belangrijk/

New book review online

Immanence and Immersion: On the Acoustic Condition in Contemporary Art - Will Schrimshaw. New York: Bloomsbury, 2017

reviewed by Jordan Lacey

Open Call | Netherlands Field Recordings during Corona Crisis

Currently around the world, life has changed significantly. Due to the Covid-19 virus pandemic, daily life as we knew it has grinded to a near halt. Billions are in quarantine, advised or unallowed to leave their homes except when absolutely necessary. This limited mobility has caused dramatic shifts from limiting pollution to record surges in internet traffic. Discourse around the world has become solely focused on one topic and similarly, although you might not be aware, we are all united around the world as this pandemic has left no corner of our continent untouched sans Antarctica.

Another effect this pandemic has had on the world is how it sounds. Here in The Netherlands, Schiphol Airport has ceased nearly all  flights, trains are running more infrequently, car traffic is minimal, tourists are non-existent and mid-day, rush-hour streets are quieter than they are in the early morning hours. Our world sounds different and that’s important to recognize and remember. Therefore, The Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision would like to encourage field recordists whether professional, hobbyist, beginner or experts around The Netherlands to take the time to record the world around them. It could be sounds captured while on walk (while maintaining social distancing), the sounds from your balcony, roof, garden or even just the sounds from inside your home.

Sound and Vision will begin taking in field recordings for preservation purposes over the coming months. We will also encourage that these sounds be made available for free re-use by artists, researchers and more just like our previous online exhibition, The Sound of The Netherlands did. The long-term preservation of these sounds will accompany other Covid-19 related preservation efforts being taken by Sound and Vision so that for years to come we’ll be able to comprehensively and thoroughly present this period to society. 

Over the coming weeks Sound and Vision will present a method for users to deliver their sounds in a structured manner. 

Sound and Vision will further collaborate on this topic with Rewire Festival and FIBER Festival for artistic presentations of new works related to these sounds as well as Soundtrackcity and members from the University of Amsterdam and Leiden University for matters related to academic research. 

If you are a field recordist and would like to get in touch and would consider sharing your collection with the institute please contact gmarkus@beeldengeluid.nl or begin sharing your sounds via: https://forms.gle/81DmLYVLw4sF2h3s8