Through my exploration of particular sites around Preston (Lancs) I became absorbed in the fascinating connection between sound, space, and my own body - tuning into the sounds emanating from these locations.

My experience of these sites brought about the idea of sound as a constructive material, and as an architectural element through which a space is transformed. Using photographs taken from these locations I developed a process that allowed me to translate physical form (architecture) into tablature for guitar - making the visual become auditory.

These tablature parts coupled with field recordings have formed the basis of the soundwalk and requires a participant to move between specific coordinates while listening. By manipulating the constructed visual landscape and giving it definition through sound, this soundwalk creates an experience that captures the found and musical elements of the sites.

DOWNLOAD THE TRACK TO PARTICIPATE, AND VISIT THE COORDINATES SPECIFIED BELOW:

A

Lat. 53.761833
Long. -2.699242
+
Lat. 53.756001
Long. -2.700893


B

Lat. 53.754410
Long. 2.701669
+
Lat. 53.750755
Long. 2.702304 

Preston | Soundwalk

'Sound and space are inextricably connected, interlocked in a dynamic through which each performs the other, bringing aurality into spatiality and space into aural definition'.
- Brandon LaBelle (2012)

My practice-led research has enabled me to comprehend the strong relationship between sound and space, and understand that the way we experience a space is largely determined by our aural perception and our physical presence within that space.

The idea that sound - as a constructive material - can regenerate our experience of a given space has influenced my decision to develop work for a specific location, and in my pursuit of a suitable unconventional/non-art space I discovered a disused railway tunnel near Old Warden (Bedfordshire, UK). This dark and uninhabited structure presented me with an unfamiliar, yet fascinating platform for a sonic intervention.

Tracing and overlapping visual intricacies within photographs has enabled me to translate the physical/structural information from the site into graphic notation. The graphic scores developed throughout this process are documents of musical ideas, which serve as a sufficient, but incomplete outline for a sound performance. 

Using recordings of the performance and combining these with field recordings from the site, I have created a composition which captures both the found and the musical elements of the tunnel. This part of my soundwork is intended for installation within a blackout space in order to fully immerse the subject within an isolated experience of listening. 

© Lianray Pienaar | 2014

Space As Outline | Sound Installation

PALAHNIUK

LITERATURE AND SOUND ART COMBINE AS ARTISTS IMAGINE THE SOUNDS OF THOMAS MORE’S UTOPIA 

More than 50 sound artists and musicians from across the world will reimagine one of the greatest works of English literature, using sound. 

The Cities and Memory: Utopia project creates something new from the words of Thomas More and the collective imagination of artists around the world – an entirely new Utopia of sound.

Using a woodcut map from the second edition of Utopia  from 1518, sound artists each took a small section of More’s imagined country of Utopia, and created a new soundscape imagining how that place (and the society living in it) might sound. 

The result is a collaborative sonic imagination of what More’s Utopia might have sounded like, and deals with issues including slavery, religion, freedom and even the current refugee crisis in Europe. 

The project is housed on an interactive sound map at www.citiesandmemory.com/utopia, featuring:

- More’s Utopia divided into 30 different regions
- 51 sound artists, musicians and field recordists taking part from across      the world, each bringing their own interpretation to the project. 

Some place, No place

This collaborative piece was made possible by Cities and Memory and is created from field recordings supplied by Le Tuan.

"Cities and Memory is a global field recording & sound art work that presents both the present reality of a place, but also its imagined, alternative counterpart – remixing the world, one sound at at time.

Every faithful field recording document on the sound map is accompanied by a reworking, a processing or an interpretation that imagines that place and time as somewhere else, somewhere new."

The recording takes us down Damrongrak Road in the Bangkok, hearing the bustle of life in East Asia’s grand metropolis. It was my task to reimagine these sounds.


Listen to both versions here:
http://citiesandmemory.com/2015/11/bangkok-street-sounds/

For more information on Cities and Memory:
http://citiesandmemory.com/



Reimagined Sound - Damrongrak Road, Thailand

Prison Songs examines the lives of the prisoners of the Mississippi State Penitentiary in the late 1940s, by reimagining the work songs recorded there.

The Mississippi State Penitentiary is the oldest prison in the USA, founded in 1901, and was and is known by its inmates as “Parchman Farm”. As well as its history as a prison, thanks to Alan Lomax’s pioneering work, it is also an important location in the history of field recording as a practice.

From ‘Eighteen Hammers’ to ‘No More My Lawd’, these songs are a moving portrait of prison life, and defiant statements of hope and unity in the face of appalling conditions. Here, 30 sound artists from as far afield as Brazil, Turkey, Australia and the USA bring their own lives and experiences to bear on reimagining these songs.

A collaborative project by Cities and Memory.

Eighteen Hammers

so similar to me
just to get it out
and everyone else
it reveals itself
and all the other parts
but it leaves strangers footsteps

it starts at the pit of your stomach
this thing that grows inside
in hopes you'll find
amongst eyes and ears
as I watch the hole in your torso
alien-like

[ lianray.pienaar ]

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