Dawn rises above a city of the future
Oct 09, 2022, 07:45 PM
"Fair, effective, harmonious future city design (either from scratch or via retro-fit of what already exists) needs to be a hugely detailed, balancing act that takes into account so many different considerations. For example - environmental impact and sustainability need to be balanced against simple everyday functionality; the two aspects are far from mutually exclusive, but their successful integration needs careful analysis and ongoing, regular monitoring.
The brief for this project asked:
1) What does a city that prioritises health and well-being sound like?
2) How can we use sound to reflect on what an equitable, healthy and climate-safe approach to wellbeing looks like for cities?
3) What would a truly green, resilient and equitable city sound like?
"I don’t think we don’t quite know the answers in any huge detail and that’s symptomatic of the lack of attention to detail that has dominated far too many urban designs so far; but…
"As with other factors, sound design in a city possibly requires balance and flexibility more than anything else – an understanding of the multi-faceted nature of metropolitan requirements and how (both on a macro and micro level) the sonic world interacts with them all successfully.
"Integral to this auditory balance will need to be a much more comprehensive, practical understanding of the interrelationship between architecture and sound, with key words such as reverberation, resonance, sound propagation, decibel, reflection, absorption etc becoming much more readily taken onboard by city designers.
"Acoustic modelling has regularly been a minor consideration when approaching overall city design. If this changes, it will be indicative of a much more thoughtful, thorough, methodical approach towards both creating new cities and adapting those that already exist.
"My piece for this project focuses on ‘balance’ and ‘integration’ with a wide range of musical influences, techniques, and styles (hopefully) working effectively together to create a cohesive piece of music. I’ve mixed together traditional musical structures, more experimental ideas and moments of pure sound design.
"I instantly loved the original field recording with its contrasting sound content – sparrows chirping, cars passing by, pigeons cooing, occasional little clicks and clunks etc. I’ve tried as much as possible to combine these contrasting noises into new musical timbres and my piece is dominated throughout by various sounds created from the original recording.
"A few examples:
Car engines have been directly developed into sawtooth synth leads; overlayed with pigeons via granular synthesis and turned into an epic organ-like instrument; morphed into deep swells and sweeps.
"Sparrows chirping have transformed into sweeping, spiralling flocks of birds; looping, tempo-synced synth beeps and sparkling, high-pitched orchestral string sustains.
"Various little clicks, clunks and other momentary noises form the basis for the various percussion loops and industrial noises that appear throughout the track.
"Pigeon coos have been twisted, stretched and layered with other elements to create risers with a serendipitous human vocal quality to them
"In fact, with this piece, I’ve attempted something that I’ve never done before in 30+ years as a composer – every single timbre used has been created directly from a field recording…I completely abandoned my various sample libraries for this one! 😊
"Couple of my own personal favourites:
"A melodic, flute-like sound started life as an air pump.
"Interweaving pitched chime-like sounds were created from the sound of teacups, saucers and teaspoons - recorded in a café."
Madrid lockdown soundscape reimagined by Mark Taylor.
Part of the Well-Being Cities project, a unique collaboration between Cities and Memory and C40, a global network of mayors of nearly 100 world-leading cities collaborating to deliver the urgent action needed right now to confront the climate crisis. The project was originally presented at the C40 Cities conference in Buenos Aires in 2022. Explore Well-Being Cities in full at https://citiesandmemory.com/wellbeing-cities/
The brief for this project asked:
1) What does a city that prioritises health and well-being sound like?
2) How can we use sound to reflect on what an equitable, healthy and climate-safe approach to wellbeing looks like for cities?
3) What would a truly green, resilient and equitable city sound like?
"I don’t think we don’t quite know the answers in any huge detail and that’s symptomatic of the lack of attention to detail that has dominated far too many urban designs so far; but…
"As with other factors, sound design in a city possibly requires balance and flexibility more than anything else – an understanding of the multi-faceted nature of metropolitan requirements and how (both on a macro and micro level) the sonic world interacts with them all successfully.
"Integral to this auditory balance will need to be a much more comprehensive, practical understanding of the interrelationship between architecture and sound, with key words such as reverberation, resonance, sound propagation, decibel, reflection, absorption etc becoming much more readily taken onboard by city designers.
"Acoustic modelling has regularly been a minor consideration when approaching overall city design. If this changes, it will be indicative of a much more thoughtful, thorough, methodical approach towards both creating new cities and adapting those that already exist.
"My piece for this project focuses on ‘balance’ and ‘integration’ with a wide range of musical influences, techniques, and styles (hopefully) working effectively together to create a cohesive piece of music. I’ve mixed together traditional musical structures, more experimental ideas and moments of pure sound design.
"I instantly loved the original field recording with its contrasting sound content – sparrows chirping, cars passing by, pigeons cooing, occasional little clicks and clunks etc. I’ve tried as much as possible to combine these contrasting noises into new musical timbres and my piece is dominated throughout by various sounds created from the original recording.
"A few examples:
Car engines have been directly developed into sawtooth synth leads; overlayed with pigeons via granular synthesis and turned into an epic organ-like instrument; morphed into deep swells and sweeps.
"Sparrows chirping have transformed into sweeping, spiralling flocks of birds; looping, tempo-synced synth beeps and sparkling, high-pitched orchestral string sustains.
"Various little clicks, clunks and other momentary noises form the basis for the various percussion loops and industrial noises that appear throughout the track.
"Pigeon coos have been twisted, stretched and layered with other elements to create risers with a serendipitous human vocal quality to them
"In fact, with this piece, I’ve attempted something that I’ve never done before in 30+ years as a composer – every single timbre used has been created directly from a field recording…I completely abandoned my various sample libraries for this one! 😊
"Couple of my own personal favourites:
"A melodic, flute-like sound started life as an air pump.
"Interweaving pitched chime-like sounds were created from the sound of teacups, saucers and teaspoons - recorded in a café."
Madrid lockdown soundscape reimagined by Mark Taylor.
Part of the Well-Being Cities project, a unique collaboration between Cities and Memory and C40, a global network of mayors of nearly 100 world-leading cities collaborating to deliver the urgent action needed right now to confront the climate crisis. The project was originally presented at the C40 Cities conference in Buenos Aires in 2022. Explore Well-Being Cities in full at https://citiesandmemory.com/wellbeing-cities/