PLO23085725 SHR6E006C~001

by

Plomer,Sophie (STUDENT)
PLO23085725 SHR6E006C~001 swornhereDownload
PLO23085725 SHR6E006C~001 wirringDownload

Piece One: Wirring

Recordings:

  • Plane sounds recorded with condenser microphone.
  • Tapping on aerosol can recorded with condenser.
  • Hair Brush scratching with nails recorded with condenser.
  • Vocal inflections (confused and worried) recording with pencil condenser.
  • Buttons, knobs and keys from 2 midi keyboards.

Many of the recordings are domestic and un-musical, meaning the final project became very reliant on texture. The sounds were also very dry, meaning there was not much of a sense of space within the final piece.

Composition Approach:

  • Mostly focussed on recording performance of sound manipulation through Abletons “Granulator III”. I recorded one sound at a time, with the later recordings being reactive to the earlier ones. All recorded sounds in the piece were put through “Granulator III” and then bounced. The perameters of the granulator were controlled with an Akai midi keyboard, this allowed me to control multiple perameters simultaneously.
  • All sounds are summed to a bus with Ableton’s “Glue Compressor” and “Roar” in order to allow the pieces to interact with one-another. The compressor is there to provide transparent dynamic control over the track with a slow attack to allow for transients in the very percussive sections and a quick release to allow the compressor to recover quickly due to the more quick dynamic changes in the piece. There is distortion used throughout this piece to create lo-fi textures.
  • plane sounds were put through phaser, as well as multiple automated effects like auto pan (set fast on the random setting), Subfilter (to add more rumble to certain sections), and utility to focus the stereo image on certain sections by narrowing wideness.
  • Inspired by Karlheinz Stockhausen’s use of scattered vocals in the track “Gesang der Jünglige” which melds electronic and vocal sounds togther, as well as in non-electroacoustic work “Stimmung”, I decided to record my own vocals, attempting to portray the impression of confusion. Influenced by “I am sitting in a room” by Alvin Lucier whose vocal sounds are replaced with the ambient resonance of a room over 45 minutes, I used a parallel resonant 24db filter to resonate frequencies in these vocals.
  • The vocals (and button/keyboard sounds) are put through ableton’s frequency shifter tuned finely with a lower dry/wet level in order to introduce minor comb filtering adding movement to the sound. Additionally, echo with an LFO mapped to the time created repeating, panned and alternating pitched versions of the vocal sounds. as well as compression for light dynamic control.
  • can and hairbrush sounds put through “spectral resonator” in “chorus” mode to create clearer tonal information in the signal, this resonator is automated in and out and is mixed with the dry signal. followed by “amp” plugin to change characteristics and add distortion, and “redux” to add noise textures in certain sections.

Much of the post production involved adding movement to samples, either by quickly repeating small sections using “Granulator III” or adding movement through modulation effects and automation. Additionally, the adding of nonlinear effects such as distortion both on individual tracks as well as grouped tracks to give a sense of texture and interaction respectively.

Piece 2: swornhere

Recording:

  • Recordings from an Improv session between me – on guitar with delay pedal – and musicians, Matthew Rowell – on double bass and percussion – and Jake Gibbons -on Minilogue synth and percussion.
  • Additional recording of “Robin Lovatt” used as texture throughout the piece
  • the result of one studio session recorded with a pair of condenser microphones in a Blumlein arrangement as well as close dynamic mics to capture guitar and synth. a bounced sum of this recording is what was used as the main sample in this piece.
  • Techniques in the studio involved the use of hardware flaws such as amp hum or guitar clicks as part of the piece and using a delay pedal to create noise textures from my guitar, a more hardware based version of the digital manipulation found in Electroacoustic compositions.
  • Main melodic part is an amp hum that was introduced when I turned up the reverb on a fender twin reverb amp. The sound resembled a sine wave or a clean bell/tuning fork sound

Composition Approach:

  • I was influenced by the minimalism of “Klang” by Jonty Harrison, whose pitching and manipulation of casarole dish sounds a created simple collage that moved throughout the piece.
  • I layerd 9 tracks of sampled amp hum to create various atonal harmonies. I used effects like vibrato and swapping the L & R channels to create variation between the different chops. samples all repeating at different intervals to create a sense of movement while still having some consistency. Later in track, lower pitches are introduced. these sounds are bussed together and put through “Prebox” (analog distortion emulation with oversampling enabled to ensure there was no aliasing), this meant that tones that played alongside eachother intermodulate, creating more texture. The more dissonant the intervals were, the more textural the distortion became. In latter half, the lower hums more largely affect the signal, shaking it further and creating a sense of chaos or instability. there are audible bits of Matthew’s double bass present in the background of this sound, adding texture to the sounds especially when pitched.
  • There is a section of the crescendo in the original sample which I used as a texture in the song. It adds tension and slow pulsing to the track.
  • There are reversed samples of the track where the synth is playing atonal transient sounds through delay and spring reverb. In reverse this creates tense building wooshing textures on top of the amp, also hum present in this sample.
  • The vocal sample has been more heavily processed, I cut out the space between words from Robin’s vocal take and consolidated them, I then stretched the clip with ableton’s “tones” warp mode to create textural stuttering. the signal was processed with modulation effects with high feedback values to create more sustain and movement as well as compression for dynamic control. Multiband compressor used to expand the mids, sidechaned to the crescendo sample to add more chaos to sections with that sample present. This is the only other sound bussed in with the amp hum.

Evaluation:

  • I am overall pleased with my compositions. I believe I utilised recorded sounds well and manipulated them in unique ways to create full featured compositions. I struggled with the time limits, as a lot of my favorite electroacoustic works sprall out with spacious explorations of sound and manipulation, whereas my 4 minute compositions feel more cluttered and claustrophobic by comparison, possibly also owing to my use of dynamic processing.

References:

cage, J. (1939). Imaginary Landscape No.1. Available at: https://open.spotify.com/track/2EY37ErvIkHfPk5QwKnVbf?si=cdf49ab9c83247a8 [Accessed 20 May 2026].

Harrison, J. (1982). Klang. Ymx média. Available at: https://empreintesdigitales.bandcamp.com/track/klang [Accessed 20 May 2026].

Lucier, A. (1969). I am sitting in a room. Lovely Music. Available at: https://open.spotify.com/track/5PREBbtubEl2QeOR0VxJVg?si=adf6d27b44a74aae [Accessed 20 May 2026].

Stockhausen, K. (1955). Gesang der Jünglige. BRAIN DISCOS. Available at: https://open.spotify.com/track/5pqgzs5NQ8f1CX5NO45R0V?si=942d89dc373a4e1a [Accessed 20 May 2026].

Stockhausen, K. (1987). Stockhausen: stimmung. Hyperion Records Limited. Available at: https://open.spotify.com/album/4MruSUdUQWg0PQCGJFoII1?si=4RZFFcYpRNmOEfB-hdQFTg [Accessed 20 May 2026].