For this week’s project, we create soundscapes for an ancient Middle Eastern city. 

And in the process, we’re going to raise awareness about an imprisoned open-source developer with strong ties to the Creative Commons community. Bassel Khartabil, before his arrest on March 15, 2012, in Damascus, was working on several projects, among them a 3D rendering of the ancient city of Palmyra. Much as Bassel was trying to revive an ancient world, you are, in essence, keeping one of his projects alive while he is incapable of doing so.

More on this 108th Disquiet Junto project (“Create a soundscape for the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra.”) at:

http://disquiet.com/2014/01/23/disquiet0108-freebassel/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://disquiet.com/?p=16588

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

More on the campaign to free Bassel at

http://freebassel.org/

For their collaboration on this project, special thanks to: Niki Korth, Barry Threw, and Jon Phillips.

Disquiet Junto Project 0108: Free Bassel

My Disquiet Contributions 2014

Thinking about ancient cities and human rights led me to use my voice for this Junto.

Wasn't sure at first how to approach this, I really wanted to play bass but that didn't seem right. I didn't want to create a sense 'orientalism' either and hopefully this doesn't sound like a bad interpretation of the Muslim call to prayer because that wasn't my intention either.

My idea to sing was based on the idea that the human voice is timeless but also, given the subject matter, it was about giving a voice to those who are silenced. 

I closed all the windows and doors and tried not to feel embarrassed while singing into a few different microphones, then manipulated the results until I got something close to the desired effect.

Image taken from the Disquiet link below.

More on this 108th Disquiet Junto project (“Create a soundscape for the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra”) at:
http://disquiet.com/2014/01/23/disquiet0108-freebassel/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:
http://disquiet.com/?p=16588

Join the Disquiet Junto at:
http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

More on the campaign to free Bassel at
http://freebassel.org/

Human rites [disquiet0108-freebassel]

This track was created using a sample of an Oud: http://www.freesound.org/people/Fantom57/sounds/160461/

The ambient pads are me harmonising with myself, then reversing and reassembling the recording until it turned to dissonance. The beat was created by hitting a piano stool with a wooden rod.

More on this 108th Disquiet Junto project (“Create a soundscape for the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra.”) at: http://disquiet.com/2014/01/23/disquiet0108-freebassel/

More on the Disquiet Junto at: http://disquiet.com/?p=16588

Join the Disquiet Junto at: http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

More on the campaign to free Bassel at: http://freebassel.org/

For their collaboration on this project, special thanks to: Niki Korth, Barry Threw, and Jon Phillips.

unearthing [disquiet0108-freebassel]

Mmmm great one this week for many reasons - foremost that we can give support to Bassel Khartabil through our music...
After watching the video of Bassel explaining his work, I Googled ancient Syrian music, and found out that the oldest music notation in history was discovered on clay tablets in Ugarit, Syria dating back to 3400 B.C.
Heard a couple of interpretations - one caught my ear. It was played on a lyre...so I found a lyre sample on Freesound ran it through Ambient_v03 added some spectral processing and a few words by Bassel from the video, and decided to keep it that simple...
 
Disquiet Junto Project 0108: Free Bassel
For this week’s project, we’re going to create soundscapes for an ancient Middle Eastern city. And in the process, we’re going to raise awareness about an imprisoned open-source developer with strong ties to the Creative Commons community. Bassel Khartabil, before his arrest on March 15, 2012, in Damascus, was working on several projects, among them a 3D rendering of the ancient city of Palmyra. Much as Bassel was trying to revive an ancient world, you are, in essence, keeping one of his projects alive while he is incapable of doing so.

The project instructions are as follows:
Step 1: View this video for background on Bassel’s digital Palmyra project:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7G7fyWS-ysA
Step 2: If you aren’t viewing this instruction on the Disquiet.com project page, go to the following URL to view three still images from Bassel’s 3D work:
http://disquiet.com/2014/01/23/disquiet0108-freebassel/
Step 3: Create a soundscape of between one and three minutes that might be employed in an immersive, completed digital visualization of ancient Palmyra.
Deadline: Monday, January 27, 2014, at 11:59pm wherever you are.
Length: Your finished work should be between 1 and 3 minutes in length.
Information: Please when posting your track on SoundCloud, include a description of your process in planning, composing, and recording it. This description is an essential element of the communicative process inherent in the Disquiet Junto.

Title/Tag: When adding your track to the Disquiet Junto group on Soundcloud.com, please include the term “disquiet0108-freebassel” in the title of your track, and as a tag for your track.

Download: It is preferable that your track is set as downloadable, and that it allows for attributed remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution).

Linking: When posting the track, be sure to include this information:

More on this 108th Disquiet Junto project (“Create a soundscape for the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra.”) at:
http://disquiet.com/2014/01/23/disquiet0108-freebassel/
More on the Disquiet Junto at:
http://disquiet.com/?p=16588
Join the Disquiet Junto at:
http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/
More on the campaign to free Bassel at
http://freebassel.org/
For their collaboration on this project, special thanks to: Niki Korth, Barry Threw, and Jon Phillips.


LyriCCal “disquiet0108-freebassel”

This is my first submission to the Junto since moving to Vermont. I am really excited to be apart of this one. I feel like its important to raise awareness about what's going on in Syria in general and with Bassel in particular. Its great to have this open source community to rally behind people like him. 

For this project, I utilized some recordings I did in my new apartment. I was up very late one night and became fascinated by the sound of the refrigerator. I duplicated that track, and lowered the pitch significantly to add the deep rumble you hear in the beginning (headphones are recommended, its inaudible through computer speakers).  The original track I did little to; theres a bit of reverb added.

I then used the audio output from creating the databent image associated with this track, paul stretched it, added phaser, lowered the pitched heavily, and gave it numerous compressor treatments.

I mixed it all together, trimmed it down to 3 minutes, and threw in some fade ins/outs

More at:
http://subversiveintentions.wordpress.com

More on this 108th Disquiet Junto project (“Create a soundscape for the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra.”) at:


http://disquiet.com/2014/01/23/disquiet0108-freebassel/


More on the Disquiet Junto at:


http://disquiet.com/?p=16588


Join the Disquiet Junto at:


http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/


More on the campaign to free Bassel at


http://freebassel.org/


For their collaboration on this project, special thanks to: Niki Korth, Barry Threw, and Jon Phillips.

New Palmyra (disquiet0108-freebassel)

not much to say, found a suitable middle eastern percussion set, a synth sound and added a couple of effects. 

More on this 108th Disquiet Junto project (“Create a soundscape for the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra.”) at:

http://disquiet.com/2014/01/23/disquiet0108-freebassel/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://disquiet.com/?p=16588

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

More on the campaign to free Bassel at

http://freebassel.org/


Palmyra Palmyra [disquiet0108-freebassel]

decided to jot down a certain amount of places over the track where I wanted to place my sounds. After doing that I processed a theremin-ish synth sound, adding distortion, compression and delay. More on this 109th Disquiet Junto project (“Insert musical objects into an urban soundscape.”) at:

http://disquiet.com/2014/01/30/disquiet0109-cragheadsketch/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://disquiet.com/?p=16588

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

eerie feet [disquiet0109-cragheadsketch]

Spanish text was taken from here: http://www.clarin.com/opinion/precios-cuide-Cadorna_0_1081691921.html - a political satirist view of Argentina. 

used Apple's text to speech functionality and recorded the audio. Added a synth+bass+beat track to accompany the audio. 

More on this 110th Disquiet Junto project (“Celebrate the 100th birthday of that old cut-up, William S. Burroughs”) at:

http://disquiet.com/2014/02/06/disquiet0110-wsb100/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://disquiet.com/?p=16588

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/



Kadorna [disquiet0110-wsb100]

Thanks to a Creative Commons license, this track contains elements of music by Juan Manuel Castrillo (“Horizontales,” from the album by that name on the netlabel Impulsive Habitat), J. Surak (“Improvisation for Prepared Autoharp,” from the album If You Smell Gas on the netlabel Zeromoon), and Maddame Cell (“Auto Tempo 1,” from the album Autotempo on the netlabel Xylem).

More on this 111th Disquiet Junto project (“Rework work from Impulsive Habitat, Xylem, Zeromoon (via actsofsilence.com)”) at:

http://disquiet.com/2014/02/13/disquiet0111-actsofcommons/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://disquiet.com/?p=16588

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

The source audio for this track is available for free download from these netlabel websites:

http://impulsivehabitat.com/releases/ihab084.htm

http://museumofmicrocassetteart.bandcamp.com/album/moma086-if-you-smell-gas

http://xylemrecords.bandcamp.com/album/autotempo

The audio was sourced from reviews posted originally at the excellent website actsofsilence.com, which is run by David Nemeth.

Pataphysics [disquiet0111-actsofcommons]

A drummer and a thief

25 years of drumming experience, interested in on-line projects to collaborate.
Percussion, electronic drum programming, acoustic drums.

Palmyra Palmyra [disquiet0108-freebassel]

Carlos R