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Reccy- Pembroke- August. Marloes.

NT field. Good starting point. Marloes. Swallows in NT hut. Andrew Tuddenham, area warden.
In field with backdrop. PA as sculptural elements. Static shots composed with backdrops of scenic
beauty or intrigue.

Going to be hard to get full kit to places typically like Marloes. Need sack trolley and minimised kit.

(HD? Mike. with HD projection?)

MATERIALS.
1. Static video 'plates' working as 'takes' of semi-improvised/arranged 'pieces'. Recorded 
either acoustically or dry (via desk or mix). Named by location.
2. Sole audio/recorded 'pieces' working as audio only presentations. Perhaps as split channel for
environments like the cube (7 speakers or front LR and side LR). Named by location. (Blackout 
Sound Cinema)
3. Sole audio/recorded material to utylise in 1.
4. Video 'plates' without me as focus but with either off-camera inputs or not.(in multiple 
monitor installations maybe??)
5. Other video material.
6. 16mm, 8mm, slide, film, digital material.
7. Other audio material, most likely 'field' but not as strict 'environment'. ie voice.
8. Sole audio/recorded material to be used in live performance POST tour. (Sea white noises for eg).
9. Recordings of SW radio transmissions using various custom aerial techniques. .
10.Written material taking Brian Waters 1954 book 'The Bristol Channel' as its starting point.
11. Drawings, sketches.



Need legs. Long grass for 'field'. (lights for nightime???)

Need Sea stands for mics. Need to waterprof mic ends.

Wet gear for placement. 

PT for hire of windsocks? 


Welsh office NT. 01492860123
farmer of land by marloes.  Pete Smithee. 01646636269


Working NOTES on BRISTOL CHANNEL ENVIRONMENTAL TOUR
(known as 'Hafren Mor' to the Welsh, Severn Sea)




The TOUR is the work. 

Simplicity. Field excursion. No Planning or minimal planning
so as to force discovery. Looking for nothing what do you find?

Coast as formal operation. 

Search for formal giving factors as well as acoustic dynamics.
'Place is always more than its snapshop'.
'Soundmap' by sequencing together audio recordings at different points
on the route, in chronological order. Heard in one session the 'sound-scape'
of the entire channel might become apparent.
(ref Annea Lockwood 'A soundmap of the Hudson River' 1989)


Its not my aim though to use these techniques to reproduce the real.


 

As a human in search of human effects and forces ON the operation of
making works in and around this specific coast and its elements.
Making 'decisions' at places as personal responses and guidance to
composing. The tour 'is' the procedure to freely participate with the
found and any 'works' made must have some degree of their context 
represented for later reproduction. 


One emphasis here could be the processes and tools NOT available in later 
settings like playing with PA signal 'effect' in spaces or large mic 
distances and placements in acoustic areas.


[Naming scheme. Place/number*/date*

Number* of event/piece, etc.
Date* in September.

Principle of SITE as part of sequence in the whole.
Lundy, Steep Holme. Flat Holme????


PA problems.
3 types of cab. 15" tops (2), 18" Bass (2), 18" folded (1).
4K genny. James thinks best set up would be the 2 15"'s and the 18" 
folded. This will look like 2 hi-packs and one bass cab.

Both full sides give better low end but use 3.8k. Might drag
the genny. Would look best. Is this important?

Later work. How is the tour presented?
How is the tour made? What is the tour?

A response to a site that is overwhelming in scale must
break the scale down into the local and the macro, the larger
'containing' field inwhich the local has its context.

Before we go, What are my interests?

Obviously theres the 'sound' environment of each 'place' but
the 'place' as a whole is a continuous line and not a series 
of steps (metaphor here for analogue infinity and 
digital 'discrete value').

The land/sea border is a clear 'profile' from space or on maps
much like a giant sine wave. So its already impossible to produce
a continuous temporal study of the whole coast.

Infact it is 2 giant sine waves converging at a point high up
the Severn.

Wavelength both in terms of audio and sea-waves. 
(see http://www.sengpielaudio.com/calculator-wavelength.htm)




Ranges
~~~
SPL and the dynamic transient (signal strength range over time)
sound of the sea. The detail and texture of sea sounds and especially
the volume, the SPL and here is a suggestion of a post-tour presentation
in a gallery setting. 
After making high quality recordings including onsite SPL measurements and 
spectrum data capture could we RE-PRESENT this using a PA at precisely the
same SPL, etc. The idea is 'containing' this force of nature in the room.
The tape machine (Nagra) would sound good but also look good as the 'carrier'
involving as it does the use of magnetic 'waves'.*

Would be best sited outside, on the quayside using James's full PA. 



(indoors)
If 35mm slides were used, rig it to output light corresponding to
volume or inversely. ie When sound is loudest, image is brightest 
(or opposite). When no sound or low, quiet sound, the image is dark or black
(or opposite). Arduino, PIC. or analogue CV control. (would be in keeping).

*. Also by analysis of data to produce the ghost opposite, ie all the frequencies
added or subtracted to flatten/re-approximate the 'real'. 

The concept of an aural negative, like with light or optical mediums.


mic placement = PA placement in the room. 
(measure~)

~~~

Brain Waters book 'The Bristol Channel', JM.Dent 1955 as a text to
compare the present in terms of folklore, tradition and social memory.

~~~

Nautical signals and time signatures. eg FL 4 20s or 4 flashes every 20 secs.
All these buoys and cardinal markers as well as light houses may be 
visible from land on clear nights. They all embody exact places, hence their purpose
for shipping and navigation. Im interested in them as 'formal aid' in 
structuring sound pieces, as indexes of 'place' but also lending an arbitrary
factor repurposed as music. Exact but also accidental.

~~~

Samples (digital) of processed recordings of the sea. Limited by the tools
at my disposal, ie NO PC. Only filters, effects and time manipulation.

~~~

Ancient sites on route (on coast) as places where time has been allowed
to stand still. They act as kind of 'free' zones where on a practical level
we might be abe to get away with weird activity. BC has various ones
including Paviland, Cat Hole, Devils Quiot, Cold Knap, Nash Point, almost
all it has to be noted on the Welsh side.

~~~

Hinkley power station! Be good to do gig outside using electricity directly.
(Dave Stokes, Community Liaison Officer, British Energy, 
Hinkley Point B Power Station, Nr Bridgwater, Somerset, TA5 
1UD. Tel: 01278 654699). One occasion to break the rule about NO PLANNING.

Also Oldbury power station. Too much the River Severn???

~~~

Ground radio waves. remote rural areas on sea boards of countries are perfect for
experimenting with recording ground radio waves. Need aerial mod on radio.
see http://www.radio-electronics.com/info/propagation/ground_wave/ground_wave.php
Leading on from above audio time lapse might work well when recording 
over long periods of time.