Disquiet Junto activity really took off in advance of the mid-April concert in Chicago, and as a result I’ve fallen behind in two particular aspects: one is getting instructions to translators in advance of the projects’ start date; the other is post-project summaries. Instead of doing these summaries after the projects are complete, I’m going to experiment with creating a post here coincident with the launch of a new project, and occasionally update it throughout the project’s development. A new project launched today, this being a Thursday, and it will run through 11:59pm this coming Monday.

There’s a number of interesting projects coming up in the Disquiet Junto series: music + 1, animation, the blues, recycling, water, instrument construction, storytelling, and the 100th anniversaries of the births of both John Cage and Conlon Nancarrow are among the forthcoming themes. But before moving forward, it’s good to take a glance in the rearview mirror. For the 21st project we’re revisiting several distinct previous themes, this time in combination; among them are original field recordings, sonic transitions, and shared samples.

The assignment was made late in the day on Thursday, May 24, with 11:59pm on the following Monday, May 28, as the deadline. View a search return for all the entries: disquiet0011-4seasons. (They will take a little while to populate.)

These are the instructions that went to the participants. To receive them via email each Thursday, sign up at tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto:

Disquiet Junto Project 0021: 4 Seasons

Instructions:

Deadline: Monday, May 28, at 11:59pm wherever you are.

For this project you will employ four distinct samples. Each sample will individually represent one of the four seasons: spring, summer, autumn, winter. You will either construct your own field recordings to represent these seasons, or you will use the following provided samples:

Spring: Birdsong

http://www.freesound.org/people/HerbertBoland/sounds/28312/

Summer: Thunder

http://www.freesound.org/people/Erdie/sounds/23222/

Autumn: Walking in dry leaves

http://www.freesound.org/people/HerbertBoland/sounds/33207/

Winter: Walking in the snow

http://www.freesound.org/people/Spandau/sounds/30833/

Once you have collected your four samples, you will construct one single track from them. The track will be between two and four minutes in length. Each of the four seasonal samples will be highlighted in sequence for one quarter the length of your track, and there should be discernible transitions between the four segments — that is to say, each sample/season should slowly transform into the next. The underlying sonic bed should be constructed only from the four samples in combination — and in that role, they can be transformed as much as you desire. There should be no additional sounds. While a given sample is in the foreground (that is, during its prominent quarter of the overall track) it should remain at least somewhat recognizable.

Length: Please keep the length of your piece to between two and four minutes.

Information: Please when posting your track on SoundCloud include a description of your process in planning, composing, and recording it. This is an essential element of the communicative process inherent in the Disquiet Junto.

Title/Tag: When adding your track to the Disquiet Junto group on Soundcloud.com, please include the term “disquiet0021-4seasons” in the title of your track, and as a tag for your track.

Download: As always, you don’t have to set your track for download, but it would be preferable.

Linking: When you post your track, please include this information:

If you use any of the four provided samples, please include the source link as reference (per the Creative Commons agreement).

More details on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/tracks

The image up top shows Vivaldi, composer of the original The Four Seasons.

• RIP, Beastie Boys Adam Yauch, aka MCA (b. 1964), http://t.co/HYygLpJz Man, this makes me sad as hell. #
• “Mode for Joe” by Joe Henderson is my new jam. ♫ http://t.co/Z0zNVHFs #
• RIP, Lloyd Brevett (b. 1931), bassist and founding member of the Skatalites. #
• Woke to three initial tracks in the 18th Disquiet Junto: http://t.co/lSzqLIp5. The theme: Three sounds in three minutes. #
• RIP, composer Felix Werder (b. 1922). #
• Drove by Civic Center in San Francisco after Frey Norris art opening, and heard no sonic-warfare audio irritants. #
• Disquiet Junto Index: In 17 weeks 780 tracks from 177 musicians; 360 discussion posts; 148 members of email list. #
• Instructions for the 18th Disquiet Junto project have gone out to the email list and are now posted at http://t.co/XdRJsrQ9. #
• If you contributed a @disquiet #junto remix of @wildUp (project #13 that was a WAV file titled “thanksJOE2″ please get in touch with me. #
• I was cautious about creating a @facebook page for http://t.co/xdF6qCg1 but it’s led to good discussions: https://t.co/38iqLD8R #
• A few more hours before the 18th Disquiet Junto begins. The theme: “four minutes, four sounds.” #
• Quite unfortunate how large a number of netlabels don’t include allowance for derivative works. #
• Great interview w/ Brian @boondesign Scott, longtime graphic designer of Disquiet projects [Instagr/am/bient, LX(RMX)] http://t.co/avdtBruD #
• Been slowly rereading Count Zero by @greatdismal. Increasingly convinced it’s my favorite of his novels. #
• Hey, @markuspopp_oval (aka Markus Popp / Oval) is now on @twitter. #
• Would someone with the power to do such things please make the Boxhead Ensemble put out another album? Thanks. #
• Congrats to @Crewest Gallery for 10 graffiti-infused years. Proud to have had a (non-graffiti) piece there back in 2009 http://t.co/kMiSFgr8 #
• Domestic sonic warfare against the homeless: http://t.co/Vn1SN7y1 #
• Instagr/am/bient track by @mapmap featured in new @newmusicbox mix: http://t.co/S3wY3Lco Full mix is streaming & downloadable. #
• San Francisco cultural institutions persist in having seasons, but the city sure doesn’t, not in the traditional sense. #
• RIP, Charles “Skip” Pitts (b. 1947). That’s his wah-wah guitar in the Shaft theme, among other prominent places. #
• If the Best Music Writing books were Best Sound Writing, Chiara Barzini’s Italian film dubbing essay in the May Harper’s would be a shoo-in. #
• Didn’t hear the Tuesday noon siren because the dim sum restaurant was quite loud. #richmonddistrictproblems #
• Grains in this enlarged comics image from @hilobrow (http://t.co/VpJnINCN) are like if Roy Lichtenstein had been a textile artist. #
• If you’re part of Disquiet Junto and don’t have a Vimeo or YouTube account, please set one up. It’ll be necessary in the next week or two. #
• Good to see Luke Fowler listed among the four shortlisted Turner Prize nominees. #
• Word processors made it easier to write longer. Tablets made it easier for readers to lug around the longer texts. #
• There’s a guy near me in the cafe who is also 1/2 way through Neal Stephenson’s Reamde. I feel like I’ve been there for months. #
• Very excited about this. RT @barrythrew: OvalDNA player Iteration 1 Released http://t.co/xSllWnVH #
• Got requests to be added to the Disquiet Junto project announcement list. It’s now an automated process: http://t.co/f2aaVTe0. #
• 26 entries in 17th Disquiet Junto project, with half a day to go. A half dozen are by first-timers, which is great: http://t.co/lSzqLIp5 #
• DropBox helped train me to keep all documents in one place. SugarSync’s (hack-free) ability to sync desktop is a nice backup, so to speak. #
• UI Lewis and the News #computerbands #
• Tragically Chip #computerbands #
• ASCII Crimson #computerbands #
• USB40 #computerbands #
• Stevie UNIX #computerbands #
• The (manhole) cover to an album I would like to hear: http://t.co/YUqZDpAA #
• Domecile Tetris: http://t.co/yM3XAZDD #
• Visual evidence of unintended sound art installation: box of dry macaroni left strewn on sidewalk: http://t.co/NEzepvY3 #
• Disquiet Junto email-alert list now on @tinyletter: http://t.co/f2aaVTe0. If you were already subscribed you’re on the new list #
• Tested out http://t.co/GoTVCZOx. Went straight to Gmail’s spam folder. #
• Still largely inured to the charms of Burial. Maybe I need edits without the runway-model vocals. #
• Discussion between Google Music & Drive teams must be interesting: what’s free, what isn’t, what’s a service, whose territory is whose? #
• If you take too long between chapters of Neal Stephenson’s Reamde, it just gets longer. #
• Woke to 17 in Disquiet Junto 17. Two more 1st-timers: from Muncy, PA (US), http://t.co/CZ4nMokl and Armagh, Ireland, http://t.co/pk34wqqr. #
• Splendid. Thanks. RT @markrushtoncom: Nail It Down, my submission for this week’s @disquiet junto (“Transition”): http://t.co/AbemvpBu #
• Recommended Saturday plan. RT @lownote: Off to grab some field recordings for this weekend’s @disquiet Junto. #
• Neighborhood sound art installation: box of tiny dry macaroni strewn along sidewalk. #

Five of the 10 most popular posts were drawn from the daily recommended free downloads: (3) thoughts on hotel bedside radio (“The ‘Classical’ Button”x), (4) a sound collage by Jane Burton and Doris Lake (together working under the moniker Public Domain), (5) Carl Ritger (aka Radere) working with a tape-based four-track recorder, (6) the static-based work of C. Cu, and (7) a preview track from the forthcoming IoNiZeR album.

Also in the top 10, not (8) one but (9) two weekly automated collections of what is posted at twitter.com/disquiet, and (10) the top-10 list from March 2012.

The most popular searches on the site during the month of April were: junto, salvagione, weidenbaum, mallet, would-be messiahs, autobiography, automaton, bitlabrecords, modular, Peter 7 Paelinck, rjdj, subotnik, Vitiello, ableton, amirkhanian, autechre, bars, cacophony, friends.

Ball, Game: The name Noah Sasso will be familiar to longtime readers of Disquiet.com due to his having been a founding member of the Kracfive collective (kracfive.com), whose Iron Chef of Music was a big presence on this site for many years, and was an influence on the development of the Disquiet Junto. Like many electronic-music practitioners, Sasso has an active role in game development, and his new project, BaraBariBall, will debut at the NYU Game Center’s Third Annual No Quarter Exhibition (nyu.edu) on May 18. He’s posted this video trailer (at vimeo.com) for the game. It has that perfect mix of pixel elegance and stellar fluid motion, like watching basketball through mosaic sunglasses:

Sasso says it was developed for Windows and Mac but has no current planned public release. More on Sasso at strangeflavor.net and soundcloud.com/strangeflavor.

App Updates (iOS Edition): Tabletop, a virtual music studio with device emulators, has improved the manner in which one swaps between devices. …
Animoog has debuted a SoundSet by Richard Devine in its in-app storefront. …
The Buddha Machine app has been updated to include sounds from the Buddha Machine 3.

In “Music Making, Shared: Communal Ambient Tracks Explore Instagram Photos, Lisbon, and More,” CDM’s Peter Kirn compliments the projects (“The results are imaginative, varied, superb music”), quotes at length from a discussion he and I had, and jokes about putting a dollar value on the Instagram project, in light of the company’s recent purchase by Facebook:

Now, given the Instagram sale for US$1 billion, I would value the free compilation inspired by its photo sharing at least a couple of million dollars. Finding a welcoming community both to spur on new musical ideas and share the results? Priceless.

The piece on the Verge, “Ambient Music Community Finds Inspiration in Instagram and Ice Cubes” by Jeff Blagdon, gives welcome emphasis to a major influence on the Junto project. It opens:

For communities of creative individuals, working under shared constraints can result in some incredible work, showing off what artists can put together with a limited set of tools. A great example is the “beat battle,” in which competing musicians are all given the same sample and compete to build the best instrumental track out of it.

Part of what is rewarding about these two stories is that they come from beyond the realm of publications that are focused solely on music as end-product. Much of CDM’s coverage is on the technology of music-making, and the Verge is pretty squarely in the gadget-journalism category. Between the two articles, an additional approximately 5,000 listens were registered at soundcloud.com/disquiet in the 48 hours or so after the posts appeared, and the Disquiet Junto had almost half a dozen new participants, bringing the total to 170 as of project 16.

The essay is part of an issue devoted to sound, which includes an introduction by Tess Thackara (who invited me to contribute), an interview with Paul DeMarinis by Renny Pritikin, a discussion between artists Joshua Churchill and Chris Duncan, Matt Sussman on Infrasound, Liz Glass on the Tape Music Center, an interview with Jacqueline Gordon by Ellen Tani, a profile of Ethan Rose by Bean Gilsdorf, a discussion about the forthcoming Invisible Relics exhibit at Park Life (parklifestore.com, a gallery in the San Francisco neighborhood I have long called home: the Richmond District), and an essay by Aaron Harbour drawing from his experience as a curator and DJ.

For my piece, titled “Sonic Infrastructure,” I use three examples of individuals and organizations whose work in sound art involves providing technology to artists and institutions to realize their ideas. I interviewed Shane Myrbeck (shanemyrbeck.com) about his work at Arup (and his own art) and Barry Threw (barrythrew.com) about his work as a solo developer (which includes developing Oval‘s OvalDNA software, a screenshot of which appears up top) and at Obscura Digital. And I also touched on Scott Snibbe‘s substantial contributions (snibbe.com), such as his work on Björk‘s Biophilia apps.

Read the essay, “Sonic Infrastructure,” at artpractical.com.