Landscapes

Posted by: mikronesia
Categories: albums
15 Aug

Greetings from Iceland! I’m currently writing you from the epic coastal mountains in Olafsfjordur where I am artist in residence at Listhus. Mostly I’m recording environmental sounds, doing research and sound designing extinct creatures for Echozoo. I also have access to a beautiful music studio at the nearby college at night, so I’ve also been recording some piano and other instrumental textures, mixing and editing sounds in the studio there and generally getting inspiration from the ancient landscapes here.

Olafsfjord
Music Studio

  Speaking of landscapes I’m happy to share with you a new album I’m releasing today. This one was inspired by a completely different environment, the rainforests of Brazil. In June I was artist in residence at Casa Na Ilha. During this residency I was again working on sounds for Echozoo. I had so much material and was so inspired by the sights, sounds and “emotional landscapes” (to quote my favorite Icelander) that I ended up working on a new album. This is the first in what I hope will be a series called Landscapes. This series seeks to meld field recordings from a specific environment with subtle ambient textures and beats in a process I called Sonic Photography.

Landscapes 1: Ilhabela   The last project I wanted to share with you was from of my on-going composer residency at Village of the Arts and Humanities in Philadelphia through American Composers Forum. While I was back in Philadelphia in July I taught a class that was a continuation of the Mixes from the Field project teaching high school students about listening and making music from the sounds of their enviroment. This project was for the students to create a Village Sound Map. It involved recording sounds from around the campus of the Village on portable field recorders, editing the sounds in post-production and creating a sound map to show what this neighborhood in North Philadelphia sounds like. Also some students used these sounds to make their own Village Sound Map remixes. Check it out!

Happy summer, be well and keep listening to everything all the time.