Sound Art and Practice

Friday, May 19, 2006

WELCOME TO FALL 362i

Professor: Dr. Phylis Johnson, 453-6901, phylisj@yahoo.com
Teaching Assistant and Lab Instructor: Josh Gumiela, gumiela@siu.edu
Course Times: Tues/Thurs 11am - 12:15pm, Comm.Bldg. RM 1016
Phylis' Office Hours: (Office Hrs in Comm. Bldg. RM 1016)
Mondays: 1-2pm
Tuesdays: 10-11am; 12:15 to 12:30pm, and by appointment
Phylis' office is located in NW Annex, B215 - office hrs held in Comm.Bldg. RM1016

Related Sites:
http://transonicmission.blogspot.com
http://sonicwalden.blogspot.com

RT 362i
Sound Art and Practice


Text: Audio Culture: Readings in Modern Culture
(ed., Christoph Cox & Daniel Warner, Continuum, 2004)

Recommended Reading:

A NATURAL HISTORY OF THE SENSES,
DIANE ACKERMAN,1990, Vintage Books

The idea that artists are capable of producing organized sound that is somehow distinct from that created by musicians and composers has existed ever since the publication of Italian Futurist Luigi Russolo's manifesto "The Art of Noises" in 1913…
(Doug Harvey, The Noise of Art)
http://www.laweekly.com/ink/02/12/features-harvey.php

Course Objective
to introduce students to the critical theory, art, and practice within the field of sound

Learning Outcomes:
*understand/apply sound theory
*develop critical listening/expression
*nurture creative expression through sound and related audio arts
*develop writing and storytelling skills through sound
*understand/apply specific terminology of sound
*participation in some aspect of audio production outside of class.

COURSE OUTLINE

Everyday Links: In Class Listening

The ABC Classic/Australia Listening Room
http://www.abc.net.au/classic/listeningroom/
Also see: http://www.abc.net.au/arts/adlib/

Ear Clips (3 minutes)
http://www.abc.net.au/arts/earclips/default.htm

Deep Wireless
http://www.trentu.ca/trentradio/csirp/rwb04/

Hearing Voices
http://www.hearingvoices.com/

Sound Galleries
http://www.earthear.com/catalog/gallery.html

Sound and Spirit Program
http://www.wgbh.org/pages/pri/spirit/previous.html

"Today, music heralds... the establishment of a society of repetition in which nothing will happen anymore." - Jacques Attali

Robert Minden/Otter Bay
A playfully eclectic composer whose engaging and emotive works are populated by instruments such as vacuum cleaner hoses, glass bottles, and theramin . His web site includes a fun Flash presentation on several of his favorite instruments:
http://www.lostsound.com
http://www.lostsound.com/sounds/default.html

John Hudak
Has released some real gems, including a quietly mesmerizing pondscape and a piece built of recordings of the Brooklyn Bridge. He also posts new pieces regularly on his Live365 streaming radio channel.
http://www.turbulence.org/Works/itravel

WEEKS 1-3 THE NOISE

Music has always inhabited the space between nature and technology; intuition and artifice. It is said to be rooted in the heartbeat and the voice, but it is no less bound up with the history of the machine.

- “Music in the Age of Electronic (Re)production,” p. 113

Weeks 1-3 (8/22, 24, 29, 31, 9/5, 7)
Negotiated Sound Spaces: Part 1 Noise

1Tues: Introduction
1Thurs: Sound Survey (Do in class)

2 Tues: Jacques Attali (1), Luigi/Antonio Russolo (2), Edgard Varese (4)
2Thurs: Listening Exercise – Field Writing on Noise (Essay 1)

3Tues: Henry Cowell (5), John Cage (6), Russo/Warner (9), Simon Reynolds (10) & other noisy proponents
3Thurs: Hearing is Believing (W), Audio Perception (5), Hearing & Perception - and ear physics; Show/Listen1

10-Day Journal: daily entries of sound observations must
be completed by Week 3. Write legibly.

Josh’s Corner: 10-15 minutes per class of music listening;
if you wish to bring in music, talk to Josh.

Text Readings
1. Chapter 1: “Noise and Politics” by Jacques Attali, p. 7
Also see: Attali Interview at http://www.sinologic.com/newmusic/sub/attali.html
2. Chapter 2: “The Art of Noises: Futurist Manifesto by Luigi Russolo, p. 10
3.Chapter 4: “The Liberation of Sound” by Edgard Varese, p. 17
4. Chapter 5: “The Joys of Noise” by Henry Cowell, p. 22
5. Chapter 6: “The Future of Music; Credo” by John Cage, p. 25
6. Chapter 9: “Rough Music, Futurism, and Postpunk Industrial Noise Bands” by Mary Russo and Daniel Warner, p. 47
7. Chapter 10: “Noise” by Simon Reynolds, p. 55

Web Readings
8. Hearing is believingwww.kent.ac.uk/sdfva/sound-journal/thorn981.html
9. Audio Perception and Sound
http://www.kent.ac.uk/sdfva/sound-journal/forrester001.html
10. Hearing and Perception
http://arts.ucsc.edu/ems/music/tech_background/TE-03/teces_03.html


In Class Listening:
1. radio art/deep wireless
http://www.soundtravels.ca/
2. John Cage
http://www.hearingvoices.com/cage.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/music/profiles/cage.shtml
http://interglacial.com/~sburke/stuff/cage_433.html
3. Dada Movement - Luigi Russolo, Art of Noise (Futurist Manifestos)
http://www.ubu.com/sound/dada.html

Additional Readings
1. The Futurist Manifesto, F. T. Marinetti, 1909
http://cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/T4PM/futurist-manifesto.html

2. Futurism
http://www.unknown.nu/futurism/

3. Luigi Russolo’s Art of Noises
http://www.unknown.nu/futurism/noises.html

2. Book of Noise
http://www.lhh.org/hrq/24-1/book.htm

3. Attali Interview
http://www.sinologic.com/newmusic/sub/attali.html

4. Ferruccio Busoni
http://csunix1.lvc.edu/~snyder/em/busoni.html

5. Edgard Varese
http://csunix1.lvc.edu/~snyder/em/varese.html

6. Frank Zappa on Edgard Varese
http://csunix1.lvc.edu/~snyder/em/zappa.html

7.
International Bioacoustics Council (IBAC)
http://www.ibac.info/links.html

8. Information Transfer in Noisy Channels (Penguins)
http://www.cb.u-psud.fr/page6.html

9. Hearing is believing
www.kent.ac.uk/sdfva/sound-journal/thorn981.html

10. Audio Perception and Sound
http://www.kent.ac.uk/sdfva/sound-journal/forrester001.html

11. Hearing and Perception
http://arts.ucsc.edu/ems/music/tech_background/TE-03/teces_03.html

Related Web Sites
1.
Sound Terminology
http://www.zakros.com/mica/soundart/f02/glossary.html

2. Edison –Phonograph Invention
http://www.tinfoil.com/edison.htm

3. Two Essays: 10 hours of Sound from
(1) France (Listen)
(2) Australia - Variable Resistance; Jacques Attaili
http://crossfade.walkerart.org/

4. Luigi Russolo
http://www.zakros.com/mica/soundart/f02/futurist.html
http://www.obsolete.com/120_years/machines/futurist/
Also see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luigi_Russolo

5. David Tudor Interview (John Cage)
http://www.emf.org/tudor/Articles/hultberg.html
Listening - Rainforest

6. City Noise Report
http://www.city.vancouver.bc.ca/ctyclerk/cclerk/970513/citynoisereport/

7. Cities crack down on noise
http://www.acousticecology.org/urban.html

8. Military Use of Silent Sound
http://www.raven1.net/silsoun2.htm

9. Ultra Sound Physics (PPT)
http://www.sci.port.ac.uk/MH/

10. Subliminal Recorder
http://subliminalrecorder.com/

WEEKS 4-6 THE NATURAL

The moment we begin to fear the opinions of others and hesitate to tell the truth that is in us, and from motives of policy are silent when we should speak, the divine floods of light and life no longer flow into our souls." ~Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815 - 1902), 1890

Week 4-6 (9/12, 14, 19, 21, 26, 28)
Natural Sound


4Tues: Transcendentalism (W), Burroughs (W), Whitman (W), Thoreau (W)
4Thurs: Personal Walden – Listening to Natural Sound, Field Writing (Essay 2)

5Tues: Fuller (W), Westerkamp (W) - Hearing Difference;
Sound Survey Results
5Thurs: Show/Listen2

6Tues: Steven Feld (W), Murray Schaffer (7), Mark Slouka (8)
6Thurs: Listening to The Naturalist Realm (Earth Ear), Vancouver Soundscape

Text Readings
1. Chapter 7: “The Music of the Environment” by Murray Schaffer, p. 29
2. Chapter 8: “Listening for Silence: Notes on the Aural Life” by Mark Slouka, p. 40

Web Readings
3. On Soundscapes (Quotes)
http://www.earthear.com/about/onsoundscapes.html
4. Transcendentalism http://www.transcendentalists.com/what.htm
5. John Burroughs – Falling Leaves, 1921
http://www.johnburroughs.org/works/seasons/leaves.htm
(accompanying notes)
http://www.johnburroughs.org/works/seasons/autumn.htm
6. Walt Whitman Preface to Leaves of Grass, 1855
http://www.vcu.edu/engweb/transcendentalism/roots/legacy/whitman/preface1855.html
7. Go to “Sounds” in Walden by Henry David Thoreau, 1854 http://www.transcendentalists.com/1thorea.html
8. Sarah Margaret Fuller - Chapter 1: “Niagara, June 10, 1843” in Summer on the Lakes, 1843 http://courses.washington.edu/hum523/fuller/Clear/CH1.shtml
9. Steven Feld, “The Sound World of Bosavi”http://www.acousticecology.org/edu/educurrbosavi.html

In Class Listening

1. Natural Sounds
http://www.naturalsounds.org/listen.html

2. Earth Ear Sound Gallery
http://www.earthear.com/catalog/nature.html
http://www.earthear.com/catalog/rainsoundwalks.html (Feld)

3. Khan’s Song (and photos) (short clips)
http://www.hearingvoices.com/works/chance/mongol/index.html

4. Rainbow Gatherings (10 minutes)
http://www.hearingvoices.com/bg/rainbow/index.html

5. Murray Schafer (About/Interview) – Music Behind Walls (3 min)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._Murray_Schafer
Patria (read) http://www.patria.org/pmtp/index.html

6. Patria (listen)
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00000HX64/202-3897135-7293437

7. Hildegard Westerkamp (About)
http://www.emf.org/artists/mccartney00/index.html
http://www.earthear.com/catalog/profiles/westerkamp.html
8. Hildegard Westerkamp – Living Sounds (Interview) (3 min)
http://paulagordon.com/shows/westerkamp/

9. Moments of Laughter (19 min)
http://www.emf.org/artists/mccartney00/moments.html

10. Hildegard Westerkamp Web site
http://www.sfu.ca/~westerka/

Additional Readings
1. Ralph Waldo Emerson Transcendentalism
http://www.transcendentalists.com/self_reliance_analysis.htm
2. Burroughs Bio and Resources
http://www.johnburroughs.org/bio/bio.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Burroughs
http://www.ecotopia.org/ehof/burroughs/apprec.html
http://www.whitmanarchive.org/disciples/burroughs/biography.html
Burrough Resources http://www.wakerobin.org/pages/Links.htm
3. Walt Whitman Bio and Resources
Reading of America
http://www.whitmanarchive.org/audio/
Leaves of Grass Excerpt
http://www.everypoet.com/archive/poetry/Walt_Whitman/walt_whitman_leaves_of_grass_book_21.htm Biography http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walt_Whitman
Songs of Myself http://www.searls.com/whitman.html

Related Web Sites
1.
Living on Earth
http://www.loe.org/

2.
Environmental Sounds and Processes (history/context)
www.arts.monash.edu.au/ncas/resources/soundscapes/ENVIRONS.HTM

3. Worldscape Project
http://www.sfu.ca/~truax/wsp.html
Also see: World Forum of Acoustic Ecology http://interact.uoregon.edu/MediaLit/WFAE/home/index.html

4. 1st Conf. Acoustics and Animals
http://asa.aip.org/communication.html

WEEK 7-11: RECONSTRUCTING SOUND

We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of the dream. Wandering by lone sea breakers, and sitting by desolate streams. World losers and world forsakers, for whom the pale moon gleams. Yet we are movers and the shakers of the world forever it seems." - Arthur O'Shaunessey

Weeks 7-11 (10/3, 5, 10, 12, 17, 19, 24, 26, 31, 11/2)
Reconstruction - Soundwalks & Moonwalks

7Tues: Marshall McLuhan (12), Lopez (15), Pierre Schaeffer (14)
7Thurs: Soundwalk – Essay 3/Map

8Tues: Janet Cardiff, Ian Chambers (18) and other Soundwalkers
8Thurs: Soundwalk – Essay3 /Map

9Tues: Soundwalk – Reconstruct as Class
9Thurs: Soundwalk – Reconstruct as Class

10Tues: Route 66 – Reconstructing Memory & History, Road Music!*
10Thurs: Road Trip Essay 4/Map
*Talk to Josh if you would like to bring in some road music

11Tues: 11Tues: Reconstructing Sound – Film & Radio, Tesla’s Lounge
11Thurs: Sci Fi Sounds – Show/Listen3

Text Readings
1. “Modes of Listening, p. 65
2. Chapter 12: “Visual and Acoustic Space” by Marshall McLuhan, p. 67
3. Chapter 15: “Profound Listening and Environmental Sound Matter” Francisco Lopez, p. 82
4. Chapter 14: “Acousmatics” by Pierre Schaffer, p. 76
5. Chapter 18: "The Aural Walk" by Iain Chambers p. 98

Web Readings
6. Janet Cardiff
Audio Walk in Central Park
http://publicartfund.org/pafweb/projects/05/cardiff/cardiff-05.html
Bomb Magazine article
http://www.bombmagazine.com/cardiff/cardiff.html
5. Road Sounds (Listen) http://www.yorku.ca/dws/arrm/arrm.html
6. Route 66 – Memories and History
http://www.national66.org/66hstry.html
http://www.route66.com/66History.html
(slide show) http://www.historic66.com
7. Tesla’s Lounge (Raymond Scott, Bob Moog, etc.)
http://transonicmission.blogspot.com/ (Go to links on this page)

In Class Listening
1. Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (movie trailer)http://www.apple.com/trailers/touchstone/hitchhikersguidetothegalaxy/trailer_3/
2.
BBC Hitchhiker
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/hitchhikers/dirk.shtml
3.
Sleep Ambience
http://www.sleepbot.com/ambience/broadcast
4. Tangerine Dream
http://www.tangerinedream.org/

Related Web Sites
1.
Janet Cardiff
Audio Walk in Central Park
http://publicartfund.org/pafweb/projects/05/cardiff/cardiff-05.html
Bomb Magazine article
http://www.bombmagazine.com/cardiff/cardiff.html

2. NYC Soundwalk http://www.soundwalk.com

3. Sound Artists Online
http://www.earthear.com/about/artistsites.html

4. Sonic City (Mobile Wearable Sound)
http://www.tii.se/reform/projects/pps/soniccity/index.html

5. Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
http://hitchhikers.movies.go.com/movienews/index.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker


6. Audio Theater
http://www.audiotheater.com/

7. Science Fiction on Radio
http://www.otr.com/sf.html

8. 2001 Space Odyssey
http://kubrickfilms.warnerbros.com/video_detail/2001/

9. Mental Radio and Upton Sinclair
http://www.espresearch.com/mentalradio/

10. Sightings
http://www.100megsfree4.com/farshores/ufoill.htm

11. National UFO Reporting Center
http://www.nuforc.org/webreports/ndxlIL.html
http://www.freedomofinfo.org/media/UFOsightingbringsmediaattention.pdf#search=%27Southern%20Illinois%20and%20UFO'

12. Prometheus Radio
http://www.prometheusradio.org/

WEEK 12-15 Digital Sound Culture

"Music is well said to be the speech of angels; in fact, nothing among the utterances allowed to man is felt to be so divine. It brings us near to the infinite." - Thomas Carlyle

Weeks 12-15 (11/7, 9, 14, 16, 28, 30, 12/4, 6)
Digital Sound Culture

12Tues: Brian Eno (17), David Toop (36, 51), Paul Miller (W)
12Thurs: Listening Day (talk to Josh if you wish to bring in music)

13Tues: Rap, Techno, and Digital Culture: Susan McClary (41), George Lewis (40)
13Thurs: Listening Day – Music; Show and Listen Day4
Due: Week 13 Notebook! With Final Essay (4)

14Tues: Thanksgiving Break
14Thurs: Thanksgiving Break

15Thurs: Stereo Forest (read Soundscape Essay)
15Thurs: Winter Walk Listening/Recording Day

16Finals Week – Scavenger Hunt Presentations

Text Readings
1. Chapter 17: Ambient Music by Brian Eno p. 94
Also see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambient_music
Also see: new ambient music at http://www.backroadsmusic.com/catalog/ambient/ambientnotes.htm
2. Chapter 36: Generation Game: Experimental Music/Digital Culture by David Troop, 239
3. Chapter 51: Replicant: On Dub by David Troop, 355
4. Chapter 41: Rap, Minimalism & Structures of Time in Late 20th-Century Culture by Susan McClary, p. 239
5. Chapter 40: Improvised Music after 1950: Afrological and Eurological Perspectives by George E. Lewis, p. 272

Web Readings
6. “Loops of Perception” by Paul Miller (DJ Spooky)http://www.horizonzero.ca/textsite/remix.php?is=8&art=0&file=3&tlang=0%0Dhttp://www.djspooky.com/articles.html

Additional Readings
Experimental Musics, p. 207
Chapter 32: Towards (a Definition of) Experimental Music by Michael Nyman, p. 209
Chapter 33: Introduction to Themes and Variation by John Cage, p. 176
Minimalisms, p. 287
Chapter 46: Minimalism in House and Techno by Philip Sherburne, p. 319
David Toop http://www.davidtoop.com
David Toop (interview)
http://www.furious.com/perfect/toop.html
David Toop (Wiki)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Toop
Ocean of Sound (Book Excerpt, 1996)
http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/1852427434/ref=sib_dp_pt/103-3730183-7826245#reader-page
Rap Attack 3 (Book Excerpt, 1999)
http://www.amazon.com/gp/sitbv3/reader/103-2001630-2845419?%5Fencoding=UTF8&pageID=S00B&asin=1852426276

Other Links
Leonardo Music Journal
http://mitpress2.mit.edu/e-journals/Leonardo/lmj/sound.html
Organised Sound
http://journals.cambridge.org/bin/bladerunner?30REQEVENT=&REQAUTH=0&500005REQSUB=&REQSTR1=OrganisedSound/Vol05No03
Live Sound
http://www.livesoundint.com/
Physics of Ultra Sound
http://www2.umdnj.edu/~shindler/physics.html


**FURTHER COURSE READINGS**

Acoustic Ecology- The Soundscape Bibliography
http://mitpress2.mit.edu/e-journals/Leonardo/isast/spec.projects/acousticecologybib.html

Acoustic Communication and Soundscape Research, Simon Fraser University, Barry Traux
http://interact.uoregon.edu/medialit/wfae/readings/Truaxcontext.html

Sound Culture
http://www.soundculture.org/texts.html

Shaun Davies
Lost in Space: Adventures in Australian Sound Art

Frances Dyson
A Philosophonics of Space
Circuits of the Voice: From Cosmology to Telephony

Tadahiko Imada
The Japanese Sound Culture

Douglas Kahn
Eisenstein and Cartoon Sound
Audio Art in the Deaf Century

Dan Lander
Introduction to Sound By Artists

Thomas Y. Levin
Before the Beep: A Short History of Voice Mail

Virginia Madsen
Notes Towards Sound Ecology in the Garden of Listening

John Potts
Schizochronia: Time in Digital Sound

Larry Wendt
Narrative as Genealogy: Sound Sense in a Hypertext Age

Nicholas Zurbrugg
Sound art, radio art,and post-radio performance in Australia

*************************************************

Semester End Suggestions
Butterflies, Angels, and Lullabies

Amazon.com, Ohm: The Early Gurus of Electronic Music Special Edition
Bye, Bye Butterfly, Pauline Oliveros
http://www.amazon.com/gp/music/clipserve/B000BDGVX6002003/1/ref=mu_sam_ra002_003/102-1710202-8905710
John Cage, Choir of Angels
http://www.amazon.com/gp/music/clipserve/B000002W0S001003/1/ref=mu_sam_ra001_003/102-1710202-8905710
Josh Gumiela, Oxide Lullabies
http://www.futurekomp.net

Thursday, May 18, 2006

GRADING AND ASSIGNMENTS

Grading: Based on 1000 points

200 points Final Essay: 5 Typed Page (DS, Times, 12 Font)
Based on Readings (similar to text), must include citations (author, 10-15 text citations, complete ref. list in bibliography)
200 points Reading Summaries (200 words) – what, when, why, how, key people
100 points 10 Day, Daily Journal: 10 entries DATED entries required; typed or neatly printed, approximately 200 concise words per entry.
100 points Field Writings – Noise, Natural Sound, Strip w/Sound Map, and Road Trip w/Sound Map
200 points Field Sessions: Must complete lab sheet per session; Lab sheets can only be turned in at the end of a session. No late sheets. Multiple sessions.
100 points Scavenger Group Project: Complete Check List; Take a picture of the item producing the sound. Write its exact location.(church bells, train, checkout line, waterfall, drive-through, sunrise, sunset, Great Wall Buffet or Golden Coral, inside a church, children on the playground, sirens, dogs barking at night, birds in the morning, crickets at night, coffee house, singing in the shower, Rice Krispies.
100 points Show and Listen Days (4 days throughout semester). 25 pts per day. Bring in an unusual item that makes an unusual sound.

Mandatory: Each student is responsible for preparing and maintaining a 3 ring binder notebook that includes 10 Day Journal Entries, Reading Summaries, Field Writings, Final Paper, and other materials as requested. At times, the instructor will ask to see only a specific assignment. However, be prepared to turn in the whole notebook at any point so that the instructor can check your progress. Clearly label all assignments, and all assignments must be legible. The only typed assignment is the final paper. Your binder should be neatly organized into the aforementioned sections. Attendance: Subtract 25 points for each unexcused absence (university guidelines)

Late projects: All projects are due at the start of class. Any assignment turned in after that point will be considered late and will earn no high than a low C.
A 900-1000 points
B 800-899 points
C 700-799 points
D 600-699 points
F Below 600 points

Syllabus is subject to revision during the semester due to unforeseen circumstances (i.e., time, resources, opportunities, etc.).