Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-c47g7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-18T03:23:53.859Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

EcoSono: Adventures in interactive ecoacoustics in the world

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 November 2011

Matthew Burtner
Matthew Burtner*
Affiliation:
Department of Music, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22903, USA
*
E-mail: mburtner@virginia.edu
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

I only went out for a walk, and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.

John Muir (1913)

This article describes several recent projects that together illustrate an evolving practice and a philosophy of ecoacoustic sound art called EcoSono. These projects foreground adventure – the live, in-person engagement with the world. As a technological sound art practice, EcoSono uses technology to link human and environmental expression, in an attempt to define a collaborative and symbiotic relationship between humans and the natural world. At the core of this work are computational and transduction technologies enabling deeper human–environment interaction. This paper describes three projects including the MICE (Mobile Interactive Computer Ensemble) World Tour, the EcoSono Institute music/science collaboration adventure, and the Agents Against Agency series in emergent and improvised musical forms. The article also addresses several key values of interactive ecoacoustics. First, it describes the importance of ‘impracticality’ in creating a productive environmentalist art work. The article also makes the case that the purpose of outdoor recording is not the acquisition of material samples, but to hear the world and learn from it.

Type
Research Article
Information
Organised Sound , Volume 16 , Issue 3: Sound, Listening and Place I , December 2011 , pp. 234 - 244
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Burtner, Matthew. 2002. Ukiuk Tulugak (Winter Raven). Stanford, CA: Stanford University.Google Scholar
Burtner, Matthew. 2005. Ecoacoustic and Shamanic Technologies for Multimedia Performance and Composition. Organised Sound 10(1): 3–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burtner, Matthew. 2011. Syntax of Snow: Ecoacoustics of a Changing Arctic ‘North 2020: Expressions of Change’. Fairbanks, AK: University of Alaska Press.Google Scholar
Butler, Judith. 1990. Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory. In Sue-Ellen Case (ed.) Performing Feminisms: Feminist Critical Theory and Theatre. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Classen, Constance. 1993. Worlds of Sense: Exploring the Senses in History and Across Cultures. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Flannery, Tim. 2005. The Weather Makers: How Man Is Changing the Climate and What it Means for Life on Earth. Boston, MA: Atlantic Monthly Press.Google Scholar
Gaver, W.W. 1993. What in the World do we Hear? An Ecological Approach to Auditory Source Perception. Ecological Psychology 5(1): 1–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gaver, W.W. 1993. How Do we Hear in the World? Explorations of Ecological Acoustics. Ecological Psychology 5(4): 285–313.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gibson, James J. 1966. The Senses Considered as Perceptual Systems. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin.Google Scholar
Goldsworthy, Andy. 1993. Hand to Earth. New York: Abrams.Google Scholar
Howarth, William. 1995. Some Principles of Ecocriticism. Atlanta, GA: University of Georgia Press.Google Scholar
Keller, D. 1999. Touch'n'go: Ecological Models in Composition. Burnaby, BC: Simon Fraser University.Google Scholar
Keller, D. 2000. Compositional Process from an Ecological Perspective. Leonardo Music Journal 10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kramer, G., Walker, B., Bonebright, T., Cook, P., Flowers, J., Miner, N., Newhoff, J., Bargar, R., Barrass, S., Berger, J., Evreinov, G., Fitch, W.T., Gröhn, M., Handel, S., Kaper, H., Levkowitz, H., Lodha, S., Shinn-Cunningham, B., Simoni, M., Tipei, S. 2004. Sonification Report: Status of the Field and Research Agenda. Sydney: International Community for Auditory Display (ICAD-10) http://www.icad.org/websiteV2.0/References/nsf.html.Google Scholar
Krause, Bernie. 2002. Wild Soundscapes: Discovering the Voice of the Natural World. Birmingham, AL: Wilderness Press.Google Scholar
MICE (Mobile Interactive Computer Ensemble). 2009. MICE World Tour, CD. EcoSono.Google Scholar
Morton, Timothy. 2010. Ecology without Nature: Rethinking Environmental Aesthetics. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Muir, John. 1913. Of My Boyhood and Youth. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Co.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Searle, John. 1969. Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Truax, B. (ed.) 1978. Handbook for Acoustic Ecology. Arc Publications, Cambridge Street Publishing, CD-ROM Edition, Version 1.1, 1999.Google Scholar
Truax, Barry. 1996. Soundscape, Acoustic Communication and Environmental Sound Composition. Contemporary Music Review 15(1): 49–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Westerkamp, H. 2002. Linking Soundscape Composition and Acoustic Ecology. Organised Sound 7(1): 51–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Xenakis, I. 1992. Formalized Music. New York: Pendragon Press.Google Scholar