Recipes can be judged, at least in part, by their ingredients. The parts of Cole Pierce‘s 2008 sound installation Piano Clockwork read as follows: “improvised piano, a clock running on a low battery, faulty mics, and tape manipulation.” It was presented at the Old Gold gallery in Chicago from October 24 through November 16 of last year. He’s uploaded a nearly 20-minute segment of the installation’s audio, and as with any good cooking, it retains elements of the ingredients, but is somehow transformed through alchemy.
Yes, there is the piano, heard in lush, echoing waves. And yes, there is the clock, represented through an occasional metronomic pulse, like feet slowly beating a path across wet ground. But it is much more than that — heard here, those sounds are buried deep in a thick envelope of backward-masked wisps, and a verdant haze of rough noises.
To download the MP3, click on the little arrow in the interface above.
More on the exhibit space at oldgoldexhibitionsandevents.com. These are two images shot at the site, from Pierce’s blog, colepierce.com:
