Rhythms of life: FYP first review

Below is a summary of my first review presentation on 16th Nov 2018.

 

Rhythm: a repeated pattern of movement or sound, usually used in the context of music.

 

Pythagoras believed that the motions of the planets along the celestial sphere created harmonious music.

FYP Motivations/context

I first stumbled upon the concept of imbued rhythms when I first returned to Singapore after going on exchange last semester (I was away for almost five months). When I returned, I felt unexpectedly disoriented, and I was suddenly hyper-aware of the quirks of Singapore after being away from them for a while. In particular, I was fixated on the sounds that we hear in public spaces, e.g. the koel bird, the karang guni man’s horn, the ez-link sensor and more. I was intrigued by the idea that these random sounds made by machines, humans, animals etc come together to form a soundscape, signifying a way of life, a culture. These everyday sounds are rarely appreciated, especially to Singaporeans who have grown used to them and are too pre-occupied with what’s in front of them (tasks, work etc) to notice.”

4’33” by John Cage

Unlike many of us today, renowned experimental composer John Cage saw beauty and music in natural environmental sounds. In his composition titled 4’33”, he wrote a score that didn’t contain any musical notes. The musicians walk on stage with a stopwatch and open this score, which contains 3 movements of silence. John Cage was trying to show that even when there are no instruments being played, music is still present.

“The sounds produced by the audience, like coughs, sighs, whispers, the wood of the floors expanding and contracting, creaking. Even the sound of our own heartbeats. The world is alive with musical expression. We are already immersed.” — Singer Meklit Hadero on John Cage’s work

 

Taking a cue from John Cage, we can look at the natural soundscape as a series of coexisting rhythms, each source of sound running on its own rhythm, but blending together to form a symphony of spatial rhythms.

Branches of rhythms


Looking beyond rhythms in a spatial context, I also discovered versions of rhythms that exist in other areas of life, namely, biological rhythms and universal rhythms.

 

Biological rhythms

Rhythms that take place within the human body. The way the heart opens and closes rhythmically, the pulsing of blood, the act of breathing, our blinking pattern. These natural acts go on throughout our day, often without us thinking about them, and they are the reason we’re still alive. These are also known as circadian rhythms, and the most basic circadian rhythm we live by daily is our sleep-wake cycle.

According to Alan Burdick, each of our cells can essentially tell the time; they have a 24-hour clock, which enables the cell to organize all the things it needs to do, just like you and I. 

When we disrupt the rhythms — irregular sleep, not eating regularly — our internal body clock is disrupted and can affect our physical and mental health.

Universal rhythms

David Alderdice is an ethnomusicologist from Colorado, and he is an advocate for using rhythms to aid us in daily life. In a TED talk that he conducted in 2015, he said that we are all intrinsically musical beings, because:

“We all live in this solar system, there’s these earthly rhythms that we all live by. The waxing and waning of the moon. The rising and setting of the Sun. High tides, low tides. Changing of the seasons, and many more.”

 

Every human, no matter which part of the world we’re located, abides by these rhythms and lives alongside them.

 


The lack of listening

With all these sounds and rhythms going on, why do we not pay attention to them?

Increasingly, it’s getting harder to listen and observe. The amount of screens we come into contact with every day distracts us from the real world (all of us are guilty of this to some extent). Social media, netflix, advertisements etc. These things not only distract us from observing and perceiving the world, but also results in less social interactions, which, according to self-determination theory, are essential for human flourishing.

There is a rise of digital dementia, a term used to describe how the overuse of digital technology is resulting in the breakdown of cognitive abilities. People are remembering less and not exercising their brains as much because their smartphones record and remember things for them.

We may feel connected because we’re always on social media, the internet, but it comes with a trade-off — we’re less connected to the physical world.

 

American musician and writer, Jason Kahn, wrote that there is much beauty in the world to be missed by not being conscious of it. And by not being aware, we become apathetic and lose connections to ourselves and society in general.


Aims of project

With all that I’ve read and observed, I feel compelled to:

 

  1. highlight the rhythms that go on everyday, subtle pulses that make up our lives
  2. to get people to listen more, be more connected to the spaces they live in
  3. to propose that rhythms can be a metaphor for how to co-exist with one another
    • accepting differences, connections in the way that we find delight in syncopated rhythms, polyphonic textures

Target audience: Singaporeans aged 20 – 45, young professionals, the age group probably the most affected by fast-paced lifestyle, workforce, uni.

Case studies

Sonic Encounter by Zul Mahmod

Zul Mahmod (b. 1975) is one of Singapore’s leading sound artists. He has exhibited his works all over the world, including Japan, Moscow, Italy and Norway. From his websiteSonic Encounter (2008) presents the myriad of sounds that inhabit the spaces of Singapore, from various cultural practices to religious ceremonies, to our bustling life in general. In essence, it draws out the unique qualities of each culture and yet demonstrates their co-existence. 30 small speakers are housed in suspended white balls. The audience is invited to travel through the maze of suspended balls as sounds of Singapore engulf their journey.

 

Escape Velocity I by Zai Tang

From ZaiTang.com: “Escape Velocity I comprises of a sound composition and a visual score. Field recordings were taken at Bukit Brown Cemetery, MacRitchie Reservoir, and the Rail Corridor, three areas of thriving biodiversity that are under threat by the needs of urban development. Sounds like bird songs and wildlife calls have been manipulated in order to prompt a form of reduced listening. The sound composition is recorded on a dubplate resting on a turntable to be played by the audience. With each play, the dubplate wears down, gradually degrading over the course of the exhibition.”

 

These sound artists have explored, manipulated and transformed the soundscape of Singapore, and they come from the same school of thought — that everyday sounds should be celebrated, and the ordinary can be beautiful, meaningful and are worth preserving.

Methodology

Moving forward, I’d like to expand the idea of identifying rhythms in the three branches that I’ve identified. I’ll be exploring the mediums of experimental film and graphic notation to visualise and emphasize the sounds that I will collect. In the process of composing, it would be interesting to explore musical concepts like fugue, polyrhythms etc.

 

Visual inspiration

 

Oskar Fischinger – an optical poem (1938)
Walter Ruttman

Abstract animation in 1920s

Oskar Fischinger and Walter Ruttman were way before their time — they were already making abstract animations in the 1920s. The German animators created a new abstract film language that parallels and interacts with musical qualities such as harmony and dissonance, polyphony and timbre.

While abstract cinema did not receive much attention in the 1920s, it has definitely influenced today’s media and digital culture. This renewed attention occurs at a time where the histories of avant-garde animated cinema are being re-visited and examined, and is propelled by the developments in animation technology.

Earle Brown
Roman Haubenstock-Ramati – Alone I, 1974

Graphic Notation

Graphic notation (or graphic score) is the representation of music through the use of visual symbols outside the realm of traditional music notation. Seeing as how abstract the scores are, musicians are often encouraged to improvise and interpret the score as they see fit. Some of these scores can be read from different angles, and even upside down. Could result in musicians inventing new sounds or techniques.

Timeline

 

Bibliography

“4’ 33″ | John Cage”. 2018. Exhibitions.Nypl.Org. Accessed November 14. http://exhibitions.nypl.org/johncage/taxonomy/term/41.

Alderdice, David. 2015. Rhythm And Shifting Our Perception | David Alderdice | Tedxpaonia. Video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rg5B7L9heo4.

“Art And Music Collide In These 20 Stunning Graphic Scores”. 2018. Classic FM. Accessed November 14. https://www.classicfm.com/discover-music/latest/graphic-scores-art-music-pictures/.

Gajewski, R. Robert. 2016. “Pitfalls Of E-Education: From Multimedia To Digital Dementia?”. Proceedings Of The 2016 Federated Conference On Computer Science And Information Systems 8 (2300-5963): 913–920. doi:10.15439/2016f356.

Hadero, Meklit. 2015. “Transcript Of “The Unexpected Beauty Of Everyday Sounds””. Ted.Com. https://www.ted.com/talks/meklit_hadero_the_unexpected_beauty_of_everyday_sounds/transcript#t-766357.

Haykal, Bani, and Joleen Loh. 2014. Sound: Latitudes And Attitudes. 1st ed. Singapore: Institute of Contemporary Arts Singapore.

Kahn, Jason. 2016. In Place. 1st ed. Errant Bodies Press.

Keefer, Cindy, and Jaap Guldemond. 2013. Oskar Fischinger, 1900-1967: Experiments In Cinematic Abstraction. Amsterdam: EYE Filmmuseum.

Kushlev, Kostadin, Jason D.E. Proulx, and Elizabeth W. Dunn. 2017. “Digitally Connected, Socially Disconnected: The Effects Of Relying On Technology Rather Than Other People”. Computers In Human Behavior 76: 68-74. doi:10.1016/j.chb.2017.07.001.

Mahmod, Zul. 2018. “Sound Installation Zul Mahmod”. Zul Mahmod. Accessed November 14. https://zulmahmod.wordpress.com/sound-installation/.

“Rhythm | Definition Of Rhythm In English By Oxford Dictionaries”. 2018. Oxford Dictionaries. Accessed November 14. https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/rhythm.

Russo, Matt. 2018. “Transcript Of “What Does The Universe Sound Like? A Musical Tour””. Ted.Com. https://www.ted.com/talks/matt_russo_what_does_the_universe_sound_like_a_musical_tour/transcript.

Tang, Zai. 2018. “Zai Tang – Installation”. Zaitang.Com. Accessed November 14. http://www.zaitang.com/installations/.

Vergo, Peter. 2012. The Music Of Painting. London: Phaidon.

Worrall, Simon. 2017. “How Time Rules Your Body—And Your Social Life”. News.Nationalgeographic.Com. https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/01/time-flies-science-burdick/.

Published by

Debbie Ng

Head in the clouds 90% of the time

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