Temporal Waves

Audio- Visual

 

My inspiration for the audio sound piece became an integration of ideas from the original source of figurative imagery of the seascapes. As a keen musician I have always had the intention to merge my ideas of art and sound and many of the imagery formed through the drawing seemed to reflect themes of data and scores.

Using the seascape environment as my main point of reference I set out recording live sounds of the sea waves. One particular piece of music I was drawn to using for this project was a piano composition called 'Le Onde' which translates to 'The Waves' written by Ludvico Enaudi. This is a very familiar piece for me and has such a fluid quality with emphasis on the use of legato. I began recording myself playing the piece with the intention of using particular arpegiated sequences within the piece to merge with the sea recordings. Listening back to the sounds merged together, it reflected too much an emphasis upon the figurative element and was also too direct a link to the actual piano piece.

I then added effects such as reverb and compression, although doing this made the piece appear too digital and detached from the original source.

When I made some adjustments to the sea sounds by softening the pitch it created a more delicate sound and also added a more atmospheric effect suggestive of space in the sound. This I then layered with the ‘Le Onde’ piece however this time I reversed to sound wave of the piano recording, by doing this it completely altered the narrative of the piece. It had become an abstraction of the original figurative elements, now suggesting an idea of atmospheric space, repetition and fluidity with an solitary quality. Allowing the listener to place themselves within a different time in the scape.

Having researched the work of Katie Patterson and her piece Earth-Moon-Earth, within which she sent Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata I the form of radio transmission to the moon and back, with the moon reflecting only parts of the score back.