麻豆淫院

2023 | 11:30 | Acousmatic
听

Umbrae (Shadows) is a personal reflection on fragmentation and distortion of human memory - a particular subjective distortion of reality, unique to each individual human being. I鈥檝e played a perilous game of moving a magnifying glass through my personal latent sound-space. I found it filled with glitches of corroded memories, inaccessible to another human being. A half-forgotten poem escaping translation from the language of my childhood; a disembodied scrap of a musical phrase erroneously preserved by my violinist muscle memory.

The original impulse for this piece was sparked by a glitch of personal memory, seeded by a 1920 poem by Polish poet Boles艂aw Les虂mian titled 鈥淒eparture鈥�. The poem itself evokes feelings of grief associated with leaving something precious behind, irreparable loss, and the realization of the inevitable final departure. The fragmented memories of the poem, which I memorized in my early teenage years, returned to me in shattered pieces, yet the feeling evoked by the poem not only remained, but seemed amplified.

Should one never abandon anything forever? - asks the poet.

Is this loss? - a random response generated by AI seemed to be a mockery at first, yet the question felt strikingly real.

The composition process and the structure of this piece reflects the nature of this experience. Fragmented scraps of various recording sessions were brought together in unexpected and paradoxical ways. Each of these recordings brought memories of a specific moment in time and space, a timestamp of an experience, unique and non- replicable. Structurally, the composition is based on processes breaking, semi-musical phrases being interrupted halfway through their development, as if human memory suddenly fails, and the listener鈥檚 attention is distracted in response to a new, unexpected stimulus. At once surprising, the new disruptive material quickly becomes familiar and accepted as perfectly belonging to the new transformed state, until it also becomes interrupted and fragmented again.

The piece was realized in 3rd order Ambisonics with the use of the Ambisonic Toolkit (ATK) so\ware package and mixed at the University of Washington Department of Digital Arts and Experimental Media (DXARTS) sound studios.

It was premiered during the 2023 Ars Electronica Festival in Linz, as part of their Medium Sonorum concert.

2023 | 17:00 | AudioVisual

听

RUINS is an audiovisual work commissioned by Henie Onstad Art Centre and premiered at NEW VISIONS - TRIENNIAL FOR PHOTOGRAPHY AND NEW MEDIA 2023.

Having witnessed the 2008 war in Georgia, I was deeply moved by the ongoing war in Ukraine. The haunting images of the destroyed cities have awakened in me the desire to highlight the contrast between creation and destruction through a work of art. With RUINS, I want to show how slowly we build our world, yet how swiftly it can be torn down by war. Supported by the Norwegian Arts Council.

2019 | 5:42 | Acousmatic

听

Emanate from proximity is a work for bowed guitar, and electrostatic sensors exploring the proxemics of sonic possibilities mingling around and through the liminal space between the electronic world created by humans and the naturally occurring transmissions of the planet鈥檚 magnetic field as they intertwine, collide, and diverge along an individual path.

aloft in the atmosphere, currents of communication pull at a present location signaling an unheard voice hidden just beyond perception.

2011 / 2023 | 11:05 | Acousmatic

听

It is a double homage to John Cage's "Constructions" and to the debuts of my learning in Concrete Music in the early 80s. John Cage wrote three pieces for percussionists under this title, and the first (Construction 1 in metal) had quite an impact on me when I discovered it on record in my youth, as contrasting with the few contemporary musics that I knew then, both simpler rhythmically and richer sonically. The structure and rhythm of my piece are not as rigorous as those used by Cage in these compositions (4.3.2.3.4 of 16 measures for the first), and the spatial distribution of the "virtual percussionists" is much more overlapping than that of instrumentalists, but there still seems to me to be a certain kinship鈥�

This construction proceeds, both in time and in space, by stacking and nesting blocks, which clearly appears on the sonogram of the original 80 points volumetric space. The majority of sounds come from recordings mainly made between the years 1986 and 1998, on tape recorder and on DAT (notably in the percussion class of the Lyon Conservatory). Apart from a little reverberation here and there, there is no transformation on the sounds. The work resides exclusively in the editing and spatial placement, as one would erect a building stone by stone, while preserving what makes the particularities and qualities of each.

2024 | 6:24 | AudioVisual

听

Realtime performance capture using custom plug-ins and commercial tools. 4-channels of oscilloscope-looking graphics are driven by discrete channels of sinewave harmonics and paired soft-synth sounds. Rhythmic elements drive gradations and positions of randomized Bongard problem graphics via MIDI. A Bongard problem is a kind of puzzle invented by the Soviet computer scientist Mikhail Moiseevich Bongard, probably in the mid-1960s. They were published in his 1967 book on pattern recognition. The problems were popularized by their occurrence in the 1979 book G枚del, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter, himself a composer of Bongard problems. According to Hofstadter, "the skill of solving Bongard problems lies very close to the core of 'pure' intelligence, if there is such a thing".

2024 | 6:53 | Acousmatic

听

Petra Anamnetic presents a stratophonic acoustic mapping of the Petra world heritage archaeological site, located in southern Jordan. This is a locale that has traditionally belonged to the Bedouin B鈥檇oul tribe, a clan that continues to play an eminent role within the tourist industry that has become of central importance to the area. The piece has been recorded and is intended to be disseminated using ambisonic spatialization 鈥� the soundscape head-tracks (audio changes depending on which direction one is facing/pointed towards), replicating the immersive and interactive experience of audition in a 鈥榬eal鈥� space.

Petra Anamnetic juxtaposes two main elements: 1) a conversation between two B鈥檇oul shepherd children tending their goats in one of the many caves that are characteristic of the area and 2) the sound of the evening call to prayer recorded from a hotel rooftop patio in nearby Wadi Musa, the main access point for most of the many tourists visiting Petra. Via the juxtaposition and creative manipulation of these two recordings, Petra Anamnetic aims to foreground the complex strata embedded within a geographically contiguous yet socially, politically and historically heterogeneous territory, sonically delineating sublimated tensions manifested between those who are native to the area and the transient foreigners who come to marvel at their legacy.

2022 | 15:55 | Acousmatic

听

鈥淭he Airborne Library鈥� is a multichannel sound installation that uses Charles Babbage鈥檚 Ninth Bridgewater Treatise (1837) to explore the persistence of transmitted sound in the media. Babbage, an eccentric mathematician whose 鈥渄ifference engine鈥� was a precursor to the first computers, posits that sounds, once uttered, are permanently inscribed in our atmosphere, he writes: 鈥淭he momentary waves raised by the passing breeze, apparently born but to die on the spot which saw their birth, leave behind them an endless progeny, which, reviving with diminished energy in other seas, visiting a thousand shores...will pursue their ceaseless course till ocean be itself annihilated."

Despite Babbage鈥檚 imperfect understanding of the physics of sound, his suggestion that our words endlessly circle the globe, provides a powerful metaphor for the transmission of sound. It is a harbinger of our current mediascape in which the inscription of fleeting events becomes permanently etched into the public record.

2024 | 9:45 | Acousmatic

听

If you make things and put them down on a table or a shelf in your studio, or if you take a cup from the cupboard and make yourself coffee and then wash it up and stack it on the draining-board by the sink, you are on the edges of still life.

听- Edmund de Waal

In my piece "Natura Morta" I was inspired by the works of Giorgio Morandi to create an electro-acoustic composition for multi-channel playback. This creative process was characterised by an exploration of my personal impressions of Morandi's paintings, although I consciously chose not to translate them directly into music. Instead, I focused on highlighting Morandi's focus on seemingly banal, everyday objects such as bottles and small boxes. These objects, which were commonplace in his time and now have a nostalgic character, are transformed by Morandi into something artistic. His ability to abstract the perception of these objects and the light that surrounds them and translate it into art reveals an inner perception that goes far beyond the real.

To me there is nothing more surreal and nothing more abstract than reality.

- Giorgio Morandi

Technical information:

I began to make my own microphone recordings in my kitchen, attaching a special microphone to my helmet to capture the sounds of cooking from my perspective. The choice of the kitchen as the location for these recordings reflects the connection with everyday objects in Morandi's paintings. My aim was not simply to reproduce the recorded sounds, but to extract and intensify the sounds and musical qualities hidden within them. This process becomes clearer as the piece progresses, eventually leading to a visible abstraction, particularly audible in the amplification of the sounds of kitchen utensils and the static, quiet atmosphere I see in Morandi's work.

The static nature of Morandi's paintings, often associated with a certain melancholy and serenity, is musically realised by freezing individual sounds over time. The development of the piece from objective reality to complete musical abstraction is achieved through the increasing alienation and musical treatment of the sounds, culminating in a surprising piano part at the end.

Background noises from my courtyard, recorded on an autumn afternoon in Bologna, complement the composition, creating a contrast between the outside world and the abstracted inner world of the kitchen. This also reflects Morandi's reclusive life. The use of 3D audio and ambisonics allows the sounds of the courtyard to be spatially positioned, creating a separation between the outside and inside worlds.

In conclusion, Natura Morta is a deeply personal exploration of Morandi's art that goes far beyond direct translation. It is an invitation to discover the hidden musical dimensions of everyday sounds, and reflects my search for a new musical language that draws from silence and the subtle beauties of the everyday.

2024 | 6:45 | Acousmatic

听

Disseminating the Circumference is an exploration inspired by the form and prosody of an Emily Dickinson poem (The Poets light but Lamps 鈥� 930), as if recited by a woman. The human voice is replaced by precisely tailored, at the level of vowels and emotional intonation, old upright piano sounds. Subjected to transformative treatments, including synthetic instrumentation and time stretching, the piano becomes a replacement for spoken language. This composition unfolds in a three-dimensional sonic space, enveloping listeners in a soundscape that mirrors the rhythmic ebb and flow of Dickinson's verses. The tonal palette, influenced by unique characteristics of and old, partly damaged and prepared piano sound, embraces both resonant harmonies and intentional dissonances, echoing the contrast found in the poet's work. Dedicated to the enduring legacy of Dickinson's poetry, Disseminating the Circumference invites audiences to reflect on the connections between language, time, and the transformative power of sound.

The piece is designed to be played on a dome of speakers surrounding the listeners, and was realized in 6th order ambisonics.

2024 | 5:48 | Acousmatic

听

This track was recorded in 鈥淭he Tank鈥� in Rangely Colorado in June of 2024 during a solo artist residency. This was my first visit to the Tank so I was not quite sure what to expect - I had about 20 different wind instruments and more whistles, percussion as well as looping through Ableton Live. The sound inside is rich and deep and out of your control! The funnest thing were the pops, hums, wind, and vibration from passing planes and trucks that let you know that the tank and it鈥檚 surroundings are the one calling the shots. On this track I鈥檓 playing鈥�.well鈥�the Mbira, chimes, a bird whistle, an Alto and C flute, and looping.

2024 | 2:28 | AudioVisual

听

The media assets used to create ""Pulseless V-Tach"" were originally captured for a VR experience currently being produced by Reality Garage for a client in the healthcare industry. It was therefore possible to obtain 8k imagery and ambisonic sound fields from a location that would typically be completely off-limits to cameras and sound recorders. For this work, the audiovisual assets have been heavily reworked and remixed to transition from binaural decoding on a VR headset to high-order ambisonic playback using an HDLA and large format projection capabilities. The intention is to give people an opportunity to be immersed collectively in an experience that usually has to be dealt with under uncomfortable and dis-orienting circumstances, usually somewhat alone and mentally alienated. It's the artist's hope that giving audiences an opportunity to participate in this immersive experience collectively, in a relaxed and controlled setting, will hopefully be a way to create a safe space for them to carefully revisit and reflect on possible moments of intense personal trauma.

Born in Mexico City and based in Vienna, Enrique Mendoza is an artist focusing on electroacoustic composition, live electronics and hybrid live diffusion using ambisonics, binaural and discrete system techniques. His electroacoustic compositions and performances use DIY analogue oscillators, lo-fi mini-synths, custom software, 3D immersive music technology and multi-channel systems.

Enrique has performed his hybrid live spatialisation sets in loudspeaker arrays at Vienna Acousmonium (AT), Lisboa Incomum (PT), Corfu Acousmonium (Gr), SonicLab (AT), Koper Dodekaotto (SL), KlangTheater (AT), Ottosonics (AT), B2 Center for Media, Arts & Performance (US), among many others. In 2020, he was invited as Artist-in-Residence at the MuseumsQuartier to compose a multi-channel piece for Tonspur Kunstverein Wien.

His compositions have been presented at forums and festivals such as Musikverein Wien (AT), Imersivo Festival (PT), Ars Electronica (AT), NYCEMF (US), MOOZAK Live-multichannel (AT), IZIS Festival (SL), Ottosonics Festival (AT), 40. 4 - Sonic Summit (US), IGNM Strommusik (AT), Festival Cervantino (MX), Ny Musik Festival (DK), Xarkis Festival (CY), International Conference on Computer Music (ICMC/SMC 2014) (GR), KlangFest (AT), Echoes Around Me (AT), Tromp Percussion (NL), Unsafe+Sound (AT), 3rd International Forum for Young Composers Sond'Ar-te Electric Ensemble (PT), Miradas de M煤sica Contempor谩nea (ES), Visiones Sonoras XV (MX), and others. He represented Mexico at the International Tribune of Composers No. 51 in Paris and the TIC No. 59 in Stockholm, Sweden.

Mendoza has received commissions, awards and grants from institutions and ensembles in Europe, the USA, Asia, South America and Mexico. Since 2019, he has been a professor at the National School of Cinematographic Arts, UNAM, MX. Enrique holds a Master's degree from the Conservatory of Amsterdam. He is pursuing a Doctor of Arts degree at the Anton Bruckner Private University in Linz, Austria, where he lectures in Digital Music Techniques. His research focuses on electroacoustic music composition for hybrid audio diffusion systems (HADS).

This spatial performance is realized through improvisations with two analog synthesizers, digital spectral processes, and live multichannel spatialization to create sound masses in space. The spatialization is created live with two techniques. On the one hand, I use the channel-based spatialization through a surface controller with the volume of each of speaker on each fader (Acousmonium style). On the other hand, I use an Ambisonics encoder to move the sound straight with the digital interface. With these two techniques, I plan to contrast static sound zones with dynamical spatial movements to create an immersive dark, loud, and contemplative sonic experience.

Mary Elias Letera is a producer, technologist, and audiovisual performer who likes to combine time-based arts into multi-sensory events. Drawing from her eclectic experiences, she produces diverse audiovisual content that could be found anywhere from a club to a monastery. Local to Northern Colorado, she'll be graduating from CU Boulder with a Master's degree in Creative Technology & Design this May.

听

This performance was inspired by Mary's many hours guiding public meditations, choosing the right lighting, sounds, and symbols to hold space for strangers to come together in one room and be at peace. Here you are invited to sit, stand, or lay down as you are bathed in ambient melodic synth sounds and colorful top-down projection washes over the room. The generative and responsive nature of both the music and the visuals encourages a deeply felt sense of the present moment for performer and viewers alike.

cold (hostile) lifeless technology juxtaposed with the warm flesh (and sweat) of living humans, this work is an exploration of being both in (and out of) control. original composition, spatialization, and dmx programming by sean | music arrangement by sean & hoang | choreography by hoang & tyreis.

听

Sean Winters is a spatial audio composer and sound-designer, multi-instrumentalist, music producer, audiovisual artist, and hacker/technologist. Over the years, he's worked and collaborated on projects involving film/television, virtual reality, projection mapping, acoustic music ensembles, stereoscopic video, audio-reactive sculptures, circuit bending, interactive sound-art installations, and live spatial audio performances. Currently working for Reality Garage, an XR production studio, he's also a lecturer for the Department of Critical Media Practices (Sound for XR, Sonic Arts), the College of Music (Composing at the Computer, Making Electronic Music), and the ATLAS Institute (Immersive Audio & Ambisonics, B2 Scholar in Residence) at the University of Colorado at Boulder. He holds a DMA in Composition & Emergent Technologies in Media Art Practices from CU Boulder, an MM in Composing for Film from the Conservatorium van Amsterdam, and a BFA in Integrative Music Studies from Concordia University in Montr茅al. Equally interested in creating content for high density loud speaker arrays, head-mounted displays & AR tech, and live intermedia performances, Sean's creative practice and research center around exploring both the creative and therapeutic applications of spatial audio in XR contexts, specifically within the live events and healthcare/wellness sectors.