Hi folks,
a busy spring arrives....here you'll find news of a new release, a 2 day
workshop for 'a quiet position' in London & a couple of new reviews:
a new release on gruenrekorder:
http://www.gruenrekorder.de/?page_id=3D7049
<http://www.gruenrekorder.de/?page_id=3D7049>
Jez riley French - 'estonian strings' (gruenrekorder digital release
series 106)
The unpredictable music of found strings, here captured using JrF
contact microphones, offers up an experience both subtle and powerful
=C2=96 it keeps me fascinated, as does the challenge of presenting the
results in a clear, emotive and simple way =C2=96 allowing the moment of
discovery to remain, tempered by the slow reveal of living with this
music over time.
I found transmitter cables, long chimney support cables, disused piano
wires stretched across old farm utensils, rust covered fences =C2=96 each
one a surprise, a discovery and a joy to listen to. Also, standing in a
simple, plain field bordering a seemingly endless, straight rail track
and listening to the singing of the telephone lines that ran alongside
the rails gave one a sense of unintended harmony between the modern
world and the nature it all too often attempts to impose itself on. I
made small cut-out pictures, placed them alongside the train tracks and
in the long grass and photographed them =C2=96 a picture story to send to
my daughter =C2=96 all the time with the sound of these long harp strings
in my ears.
a workshop:
a quiet position
the act & art of listening through field recording
(an introduction to some aspects)
a two day workshop / exploration with Jez riley French
Saturday June 2nd / Sunday June 3rd
@ SoundFjord, London, UK
=C2=A330 for both days - very limited places available
for more information & to book your place:
http://www.wegottickets.com/event/165674
<http://www.wegottickets.com/event/165674>
field recording, in all its forms, has been through incredible creative
growth in the last few decades & yet its essential power to engage us in
the act & art of listening remains inextricably linked to its subtle
simplicity, its ability to make us listen ever more closely to the world
in which we move by making us stop for a time....JrF
this two day event, incorporating an introductory talk, recording &
listening in the locale, playback, extensive opportunity for asking
questions & a live performance, aims to be a sociable sharing of
knowledge & a chance for us to listen more closely for a while.
alongside his own creative practice Jez riley French also tutors
alongside Chris Watson on the regular Wildeye location sound courses
across Europe, delivers one-off workshops worldwide, lectures on both
field recording & intuitive composition, runs the engraved glass / .
point engraved / a quiet position labels & makes a range of specialist
audio devices. In recent years Jez has been artist in residence with
organisations in Italy, Japan, Korea, Austria, Belgium, Estonia &
Portugal.
www.jezrileyfrench.blogspot.com
<http://www.jezrileyfrench.blogspot.com/>
the event is open to all regardless of previous experience of field
recording. We will be venturing out into the locale to do some recording
however so it would be ideal if you had access to a recorder /
microphones if you wish to make some of your own recordings.
day one: 12.30 - 6pm
informal, illustrated talk covering a basic introduction to such things
as:
. what does field recording mean ? both as a practice & an approach to a
closer relationship to listening
. conventional microphones & audio recorders
. extended techniques: contact microphones / hydrophones / coils / bat
detectors
Jez will also discuss certain key aspects of his own current work such
as:
. audible silence
. photographic scores
questions, both during & after the talk will be most welcome & attendees
will have the chance to ask anything related to field recording &
listening. A sharing of knowledge between the entire group is the
intention.
We will then venture out into the locale, listening, searching for
sounds & dealing with any further questions that arise. Jez will have
some spare JrF contact mics, hydrophones & coils with him for those
participants who don't already have some to try on the day.
day two: 12.30 - 9pm
meeting at the SoundFjord space, the afternoon will begin with further
explorations around the locale. We'll return to the space later in
the afternoon for a playback session of recordings made by participants
during the workshop. We will collectively listen & discuss the tracks,
offering feedback where appropriate. Folks are welcome to bring another
short extract of their work for playback / discussion too & hopefully
we'll have time to hear them all.
after a break for some food, in the evening Jez will give a live
performance based around recordings from his `audible silence'
series of works & incorporating elements from the direct locale.
it would be helpful if participants let us know in advance what
equipment they'll be bringing with them & also how they wish to
playback their recordings during the playback session. Please send this
info directly to Jez at
two new reviews of JrF releases from 'the field reporter
<http://thefieldreporter.wordpress.com/> ' blog:
Four objects. JEZ RILEY FRENCH
(Engraved Glass 2011)
Jez riley French's Four Objects is an exploration into the
amplification of sound miniatures. Over the course of forty minutes
French directs his microphones towards four different objects,
including: a piezo disc microphone, a teasel plant, a slate window, a
tea flask. These pieces are strategically presented without any
compositional intent, each of them being unmodified field recordings. As
stated on his website French questions the use of processed sound,
concerned that it is removing our ability to listen. Four Objects can
therefore be read as an exercise in listening, a form of
anti-composition which challenges the audience to become fully immersed
within its microscopic worlds.
When French isn't releasing his own material he is well-known for
creating microphones. Four Objects showcases them well. The first
track, a piezo disc slowly breaking, captures the tiny crackles and pops
of a microphone in its death throes. For ten minutes we listen to the
various sounds associated with this process. As with the ensuing
recordings the piezo disc is presented without any external ambience. In
light of French's raison d'=C3=AAtre this sole focus upon a single
object enables the audience to be absorbed into its sonic realm without
any other distraction.
A teasel plant on a windy day takes us to the surface of this prickly
plant as it sways in the wind. A contact microphone amplifies the
plant's fast irregular rattles, each with its own pitch and wooden
resonance. Listening to the recording we are drawn into the plant as it
moves from side to side.
A slate windowsill captures a low drone-like vibration emanating from
the surface of a sill. While the other tracks feature variously
recognisable tonalities and slight moments of silence a slate
windowsillhas a relentless propulsion that is at once mesmeric and
disturbing.
A flask at q-02 is the final track in the release. Here French presents
the sound of hot air as it slowly escapes from a tea-flask. The
track's placement at the end of the release seems critical,
reminding us that a world of sound lies before us in the most mundane of
objects.
French's Four Objects is as much a celebration of sound as it is
about the act of listening. The duration of the tracks requires the
audience to listen beyond the limits of their usual attention span. It
also obliges the audience to forego the anticipation of listening for
climactic sound-events. Instead French invites us to lose ourselves
within the moment of listening and to recognise that music naturally
exists around us.
-Jay-Dea Lopez
The bright work. JEZ RILEY FRENCH
(Engraved Glass 2009 / 2012)
`The bright work', originally published on 2009 and reissued on
February of 2012, was largely made with hydrophones, very likely the
ones Jez Riley French builds himself.
Hydrophones offer a very particular experience as what we hear is sound
propagated through water, though a fluid. Fluids and sound waves have
similar behaviors under certain circumstances, but what is interesting
here is that the hydrophone hearing experience would suppose an
immersive experience, but instead `The bright work' seems to be
more about textures, scales and friction. It's like if water became
a large membrane we use to listen to the surface of the solid container
of this water. A tactile and visual surface with detailed features and
beautiful narratives.
Water and fluids in general acquire the shape of their container, they
also tend to propagate and its behavior changes based on the molecular
interaction with its container. On a more cultural approach water serves
as mirror, the origin of the image. Anyway on `The bright work'
I'd say water is more of a metaphor to the space between ourselves
and the things, to the distance we need to establish to have an image of
things.
Water here works like some sort of a membrane, a magnifying glass, a
medium to relate to the micro, to a reductionist approach through the
possibility of listening to sounds otherwise inaccessible for human
listening.
What is quite poetic here is what does Jez Riley French finds on this
sounds that makes him want to play them to us. How his mediation as
artist and sound capturer imprints his experience in these sounds: how
his mediation imprints his emotions, thoughts, reflections and questions
in the sounds we listen here.
`The bright work' is a work that serves to understand all the
depth and transcendence behind the premise that in sound art, sound is
both the medium and subject. There is an immanent sort of
"extraordinary" and revealing element in the hearing experience,
in the reduction of the hearing that puts the listener in contact with
something that he can't necessarily comprehend but that he feels and
experiences. This is no longer a metaphorical, figurative and
descriptive process: this is sort of a metaphysical exercise: a way to
sensibly address questions about ourselves and about the world.
Again, `The bright work' is a very successful work as it
provides a universal sense to the act of Jez Riley French recording in
the water of some specific sites with hydrophones. The sense found here
is the sense of relating to the world and relate to ourselves in a way
different to the question / answer approach. More like if we subtract
ourselves rationally in order to feel the cosmos we are part of and have
an actual meaningful transcendental experience.
-John McEnroe
"While a picture is worth a thousand words, a
sound is worth a thousand pictures." R. Murray Schafer via Bernie Krause.
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