Sonic Revelations, Sonic Revolutions

There are some benefits to procrastination. In all honesty, I completed the readings this morning, and I am in no way apologetic, because of the snow.

I’m from Florida. Snow is new and fantastic and cold, and everyone I know is making fun of me for being so thrilled, because apparently it’s not “really snowing.” Listening to John Luther Adams again this morning, I realized: this is really snowy music. I was blown away by how perfectly wintery it was, and then I read the papers about how JLA’s purpose was to compose Alaska. This blew me away even more, because he had so exactly raised that image in my mind even when I had very little background knowledge of the music. You know when you completely adore something so much you can’t put it into words? I’m listening to The Light That Fills My World right now, and I feel exactly like that.  I think I’m going to walk around listening only to John Luther Adams for the rest of the winter. I am amazed, and enthralled, and hearing JLA’s work and staring out the window at the snow made my day. It was spectacular. It sounds so much like watching snow fall. The background stays the same and there is very little variation in the scene (some people walking by) but then the shimmer of the falling ice everywhere, and the patterns of the snowfall changing every second makes it stunning. I was never bored watching the snow fall or listening to John Luther Adams’ music.

The idea of composing places is also such an incredible idea to me. I wish I was more musical so I could try to compose Miami Beach, or Oberlin, or my aunt’s backyard. In the meantime, I’ll have to settle for listening to Alaska over and over again.

There were four sirens, really loud, making music. How is that not awsome. This piece is the best thing, in my opinion, that we have listened to in class so far. After our class last night, I ook some time and though about why I love it and why It is musical to me. The theme of layers kept popping into my head. My appreciation for this piece developed and is manifestedin layers. At the onset, the first layer was the “cool” part. Four sirens blasting out pitches just oozes intrigue and badassery. The first layer of appreciation was not sonic, it was just the concept that got my attention. Next, the actual sounds, tthe second layer, was stunning. The fact that a combination of four air sirens meant to communicate danger or fear, could make such a musical sound, was a breath of fresh air to me. Although i have enjoyed the music so far in this class, musical sounds have not been a theme. The third layer was the amazing rollercoaster ride i was put through while lstening to this. The anticipation for the unknown was amazing. I didnt kn ow what was going to happen when all of the pitches and the pice itself reached their zenith. When it happened, although perfect unison was not achieved, there was an incredible release. I loved the emotions that were manipulated in me and the controll the piece had over them. The fourth layer was the appreciation for the things i could not hear. There were interensting things going on that i could not quite discern. Maybe they were in the recording istself or in the seemingly inadequite speaker system. (This piece required a subwoofer of epic proportions). Regardless of where they came from the sounds or lack there of were intriguing and inspiring. The sixth and final layer of appreciation was for the layers of the piece. This work had an innumerable amount of layers and depths to explore sonicall. There were new things to discover and i will be listening to this piece a lot to discover them. I loved these four simple sirens.

If you couldn’t tell from the title, last night’s pieces were pretty intense for me. Both had so much activity within and it was often hard to concentrate on any specific element.

I did enjoy “Q” because of that reason, though. It never got boring; my ear was constantly shifting from tone to overtone and beat to beat. The summary of “Q” notes that “the oscillators spatially contain the instrumentalists while at the same time the instrumentalists tonally contain the oscillators….The oscillators operate as fixed gravitational centers around which the instrumental sounds constantly orbit.” I definitely agree with that image, although it didn’t really seem like the oscillators were being contained as much as they were battering against the instrumentalists’ “orbit”. The beating patterns were so many and so strong that they felt like giant waves covered with sonic spikes, breaking past the reedy instrumental tones and blasting all this pressure in your face. I had this weird sense of multiple-dimension-like hearing; my ears (and body) picked up both the physical vibrations of the beating patterns and the sonic dissonance and overtones stemming from the instrumentalists and pure tones. Occasionally one “dimension” would overpower the other, but I didn’t try to find the other side again–”Q” is such a powerful piece that it would be like trying to cross a flooding river. If that makes any sense.

“Triadic Iteration Lattices” was a lot harder for me to appreciate. I’m slightly phobic of tornadoes, so whenever I hear a siren, sprinting to the basement is all I can think of. Compounded to that was the classic association with air raids and bomb shelters. Thus, listening to this piece was kind of terrifying. It was a much more visual experience than “Q,” and it was hard to disconnect from those visuals and pay attention to the sound itself. Still, the synchronization between the sirens was fascinating–hearing the rise and decay of each siren and then all the caterwauling combined was a pretty breathtaking (and gutwrenching) experience. My ears!

John Luther Adams’ “Triadic Iteration Lattices” is an incredible concept, a fascinating piece of music, and a feeling that I still have in my gut. While I’ve really enjoyed everything we’ve listened to in and out of class, this one gave me the most intense physical and intellectual ride of any. It gave me feelings from my head to my toes, and on the inside and outside of my body. The sirens are really the perfect instrument for the effect I believe Adams was going for; you’re never quite sure where the peak pitch will be, and the increase and decrease in pitch is perfectly gradual and smooth while maintaining an incredible level of intensity. More effective than the sirens themselves was the relationship between them. As a low siren finally hit its demise, a high one would take off into the sky, rocketing your body up into the stratosphere, and likewise when the highs went down and the lows went up. These moments gave me that “roller coaster” feeling – the anxiety, the uncertainty of the moment of climax, but also the feeling of simply being shot up into the air and being surrounded and enveloped by the sky. This feeling of being catapulted was so perfectly captured by the sirens that each time they climaxed I thought my body would jump out of the seat and fling itself in the air. It gave me this massive combination of euphoria and anxiety that was just fantastic. I think what makes me happiest about stuff like this is that you can experience something so physical to the point where you’re actually convinced that a giant catapult is throwing you into the atmosphere, and then you realize that mere sounds were doing the work. Nuts.