Foot pedals on the 1924 Skinner organ at the Legion of Honor in San Francisco.
An ongoing series cross-posted from instagram.com/dsqt.
What Sound Looks Like
An ongoing series cross-posted from instagram.com/dsqt
Disquiet Junto Project 0256: Music in Place
Record a short piece of music using the sounds around you.
Each Thursday in the [Disquiet Junto group](https://disquiet.com/junto/), a new compositional challenge is set before the group’s members, who then have just over four days to upload a track in response to the assignment. Membership in the Junto is open: just join and participate. A SoundCloud account is helpful but not required. There’s no pressure to do every project. It’s weekly so that you know it’s there, every Thursday through Monday, when you have the time.
Tracks will be added to this playlist for the duration of the project:
This project was posted in the morning, California time, on Thursday, November 24, 2016, with a deadline of 11:59pm wherever you are on Monday, November 28, 2016.
These are the instructions that went out to the group’s email list (at [tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto](http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto)):
Disquiet Junto Project 0256: Music in Place
Record a short piece of music using the sounds around you.
Step 1: The goal of this project is to record a piece in place using only sounds from that place. Block out time, maybe an hour or so, and a place where you think you’d like to do the work. Also plan on portable equipment — laptop, iPad, OP-1, etc. — that would suit the endeavor.
Step 2: During the time planned in advance during Step 1, record sounds around you and shape them into an original piece of music, editing and processing as you see fit.
Five More Important Steps When Your Track Is Done:
Step 1: Per the instructions below, be sure to include the project tag “disquiet0256”(no spaces) in the name of your track. If you’re posting on SoundCloud in particular, this is essential to my locating the tracks and creating a playlist of them.
Step 2: Upload your track. It is helpful but not essential that you use SoundCloud to host your track.
Step 3: In the following discussion thread at llllllll.co please consider posting your track.
http://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0256-music-in-place/5482
Step 4: Annotate your track with a brief explanation of your approach and process.
Step 5: Then listen to and comment on tracks uploaded by your fellow Disquiet Junto participants.
Deadline: This project was posted in the morning, California time, on Thursday, November 24, 2016, with a deadline of 11:59pm wherever you are on Monday, November 28, 2016.
Length: The length is up to you, but three to four minutes sounds about right.
Title/Tag: When posting your track, please include “disquiet0256”in the title of the track, and where applicable (on SoundCloud, for example) as a tag.
Upload: When participating in this project, post one finished track with the project tag, and be sure to include a description of your process in planning, composing, and recording it. This description is an essential element of the communicative process inherent in the Disquiet Junto. Photos, video, and lists of equipment are always appreciated.
Download: It is preferable that your track is set as downloadable, and that it allows for attributed remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution).
Linking: When posting the track online, please be sure to include this information:
More on this 256th weekly Disquiet Junto project — “Music in Place: Record a short piece of music using the sounds around you.”— at:
https://disquiet.com/0256/
More on the Disquiet Junto at:
https://disquiet.com/junto/
Subscribe to project announcements here:
http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/
Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:
http://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0256-music-in-place/5482
There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion.
Image associated with this project is by Matthew Betts, used thanks to a Creative Commons license:
flic.kr/p/8feVqm
The Tape Machine
An Ondes Magnétique in action
The OM-1 Ondes Magnétique is an elegant little box that uses fluctuations in cassette tape speed to effect otherworldly yet melodic material. This video shows SineRider putting it to use. The layering effect is the result of the OM-1 being played through a “triple delay,” meaning each sequence is heard several times, providing its own gentle, hazy backdrop as it gathers and fades. It’s the latest piece I’ve added to [my ongoing YouTube playlist](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAgCxRbmR1MJxihgJkCPEnehAPvjoF71-) of fine [“Ambient Performances.”](https://disquiet.com/2016/04/30/a-youtube-playlist-of-ambient-performances/)
For reference, here’s [a demo video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YbyZPRTo10) showing the device put to use on flute, vocal, and other source audio:
Track originally posted at SineRide’s [YouTube channel](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09PBcvu5byM). More from SineRider, aka Devin Powers of Norwood, Massachussets, at [sinerider.bandcamp.com](http://www.sinerider.bandcamp.com/), [soundcloud.com/sinerider](https://soundcloud.com/sinerider), and [twitter.com/SineRider](https://twitter.com/SineRider). More on the Ondes Magnétique at [ondemagnetique.com](http://www.ondemagnetique.com/). The device is the work of Scott Campbell, who is based in New Orleans, Louisiana.
Disquiet Junto Project 0255: Capone’s Ghost
What does the banjo music of the fabled criminal sound like?
Each Thursday in the [Disquiet Junto group](https://disquiet.com/junto/), a new compositional challenge is set before the group’s members, who then have just over four days to upload a track in response to the assignment. Membership in the Junto is open: just join and participate. A SoundCloud account is helpful but not required. There’s no pressure to do every project. It’s weekly so that you know it’s there, every Thursday through Monday, when you have the time.
Tracks will be added to this playlist for the duration of the project:
This project was posted shortly after noon, California time, on Thursday, November 17, 2016, with a deadline of 11:59pm wherever you are on Monday, November 21, 2016.
These are the instructions that went out to the group’s email list (at [tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto](http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto)):
Disquiet Junto Project 0255: Capone’s Ghost
What does the banjo music of the fabled criminal sound like?
Step 1: Ghost stories are prevalent throughout cultures. When they involve music, they manifest in ways that find parallels between two intangibles: ethereal presences, and a cultural form that you can, generally speaking, neither see nor touch. Now consider the case of Al Capone, who played banjo during his time on the famed prison island of Alcatraz in the San Francisco Bay — a banjo that is said to be heard long after his death.
Step 2: Create a short piece of what you think Capone’s ghostly banjo sounds like.
Five More Important Steps When Your Track Is Done:
Step 1: Per the instructions below, be sure to include the project tag “disquiet0255”(no spaces) in the name of your track. If you’re posting on SoundCloud in particular, this is essential to my locating the tracks and creating a playlist of them.
Step 2: Upload your track. It is helpful but not essential that you use SoundCloud to host your track.
Step 3: In the following discussion thread at llllllll.co please consider posting your track. (Assuming you post it on SoundCloud, a search for the tag will help me construct the playlist.)
http://llllllll.co/t/capones-ghost-disquiet-junto-project-0255/
Step 4: Annotate your track with a brief explanation of your approach and process.
Step 5: Then listen to and comment on tracks uploaded by your fellow Disquiet Junto participants.
Deadline: This project was posted shortly after noon, California time, on Thursday, November 17, 2016, with a deadline of 11:59pm wherever you are on Monday, November 21, 2016.
Length: The length is up to you, but two minutes sounds about right.
Title/Tag: When posting your track, please include “disquiet0255”in the title of the track, and where applicable (on SoundCloud, for example) as a tag.
Upload: When participating in this project, post one finished track with the project tag, and be sure to include a description of your process in planning, composing, and recording it. This description is an essential element of the communicative process inherent in the Disquiet Junto. Photos, video, and lists of equipment are always appreciated.
Download: It is preferable that your track is set as downloadable, and that it allows for attributed remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution).
Linking: When posting the track online, please be sure to include this information:
More on this 255th weekly Disquiet Junto project — “Capone’s Ghost: What does the banjo music of the fabled criminal sound like?”— at:
https://disquiet.com/0255/
More on the Disquiet Junto at:
https://disquiet.com/junto/
Subscribe to project announcements here:
http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/
Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:
llllllll.co/t/capones-ghost-disquiet-junto-project-0255/
There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion.
Public-domain mugshot associated with this project from Wikipedia.
Major Thanks to Adobe Books, Marc Kate
For last night's 33 1/3 event
I had a great time last night yapping with Evie Nagy about our respective 33 1/3 books at Adobe Books in San Francisco under the informed guidance of the gracious Marc Kate. When Evie talked about Devo’s *Freedom of Choice*, I was instantly transported back to my friend Evan Cooper’s basement, circa high school. I was gonna read the part about Gracenote and cultural metadata from my book about Aphex Twin’s *Selected Ambient Works Volume II*, but it’s a little long at six pages, so instead I played “White Blur 1” and read the bit about that track from the first chapter of the book. It was especially timely, what with Brian Eno having come out of the woodwork earlier this week to reaffirm the definition of ambient, in his mind, to being rooted in generative processes, which is what the wind chime is all about. Thanks to everyone who came out. I met some Twitter avatars in the flesh for the first time, saw people I hadn’t seen in ages, intrigued some folks about the weekly Disquiet Junto projects, responded to audience questions about stuff like the changing nature of canonical albums and the role of description in music criticism, mentioned the upcoming Futuredraft talk I’m giving on December 1 about doorbells, and had phenomenal al pastor tacos and habanero salsa down the block from Adobe at Taqueria Guadalajara. (That’s me on the left in the photo and Marc Kate on the right.)
There were good questions last night, both from the host, Marc Kate, and from the audience. I thought I’d summarize and elaborate some of them here:
**Q: What does the change in music-listening habits mean in terms of how works are defined as canonical?**
A: To me, the decline in the concept of a cultural canon is an overall positive, not just a net positive. Individual works are less likely to be singled out as hulking achievements, forced to bear weight that they can’t support without consensual hallucination and received idolatry. In the place of that canon we have not only a much broader sense of cultural output, but we also look less at individual works and artists/bands, and more at scenes and communities and time periods. That’s a much more realistic and holistic way to appreciate culture.
**Q: Used to be you couldn’t hear everything released, and record reviews filled that void, let you know what to expect. What role does description play in music criticism today, in the age of streaming?**
A: I think the most important role of description hasn’t changed — it’s less about describing how the music sounds, and more about describing how the music works, what to listen for.