From Gardening through to Clouds

I am very pleased to be able to share here, the audio story that we developed through our project out and about with Transported. It’s called From Gardening through to Clouds.

From Gardening through to Clouds is an audio journey through South Holland that reflects on the importance of people having their own voice and naming the world around them. You’ll hear different people talking about their local area and the things that are important to them. You’ll also hear some environmental recordings  and some imaginary journeys described along the way.

In June and July, we visited festivals, gardens and parks to play music and sound and bring people together. But we didn’t want to people just to listen, we wanted them to speak too, and make their voices and the consultation conversations our material for creating a new piece that captures the importance of voicing your opinions. With all this in mind, it feels like much of this project has happened already, in the moments when over 80 people took a moment to speak into the microphone.

We collected nearly 4 hours of recordings and the result is a 15 minute audio story with that reflects on the process of consultation and gives voice to the thoughts, concerns, ideas and stories of the people we encountered.

Undertaking direct research in the community like Transported have, is a process where people are given the chance to talk about their world, and name it using their own language and style. So in addition to capturing discussions and conversations, I also asked people to trace out journeys that were important to them across the district, reading out the names of farms, villages, houses and roads along the way and together, creating a vocal map in the accents of local people that forms the structure of the piece.

With thanks to all of the generous people who gave their time and their voice, to Andrew Dennis, to the Institute of Crazy Dancing, to the Nu Urban Gardeners and to the Transported team.

Did you contribute your voice?

If you were kind enough to let me record your voice during our project for Transported, then you may hear it in the audio documentary that I’m composing to represent the journeys and conversations we shared during the project.

There are over 100 recordings, made over 6 days out and about in South Holland. They range from people talking about their local area, sharing stories, talking about what is important in their life as well as giving their thoughts on the huge potential that Transported has to make a difference in their district.

Right now, I’m working on some final editing and shaping, and will then share the piece with Transported, who will make it available on line. That’s when you may find you hear your own voice! There are really only a few people who didn’t make it in to the piece, and the main reason for that was the unfortunate generator buzzing just near them, or a particularly loud chainsaw demonstration in the back ground!

More to come, but for now, some more images of what we got up to….

Museums at night and our last few days.

We did three days completing our tour last weekend and had the best time at Ayscoughfee Hall and Boston central park. So many people came over, curious to hear the voices and experience the Sound Spiral. We had school groups, couples out for the day, families exploring the gardens and even a few dogs look in.

Thanks definitely go to Asycoughfee Hall for being so supportive and for also letting us sleep in the gardens over night. A real treat to get to see and hear the gardens in the moonlight!

Here’s a few images to show the things we got up to. I also spent time with lots of generous people adding new recordings to our collection by asking people to trace a journey that they make on the map and reading out the place, street, landmark names that occur along it. You can listen to those below too

The next step is to start working with all of the material we have and create a new piece for the Sound Spiral which we’ll share with everyone in the next couple of months. Thanks everyone for visiting!

New voices

We’ve a growing collection of local voices now, from events in Holbeach, Frampton and Sutton Bridge. They’ll all be transformed into a piece of sound art for the Sound Spiral and Transported.

To add to the stories and thoughts shared so far, we’re going to be recording local voices reading historical texts about the fen lands and farming in the fens. These texts will ‘ground’ the other recordings and create a sonic landscape (of text about the landscape!) for them to sit on…

Here are four more local voices, all distinct in their message and sounds…see you in Spalding and Boston next weekend!

Gathering in Sutton Bridge

We got busy making consultation an art form at the Sutton Bridge Vintage Fun Day.

The community researchers caught up with lots of people and all were happy to have us capture their voices and their thoughts on art and its place in their lives. Below are just some snippets of recordings of the many people we spoke to. Different ideas, different voices…

This weekend, we’re at Framfest, in Frampton, where visitors to the Spiral will be able to hear the voices from Sutton Bridge, tell us whether they agree and donate their own voice too.

Fingers crossed for sun!

The Curlew Centre

In the studio this afternoon preparing for our trip out on Sunday to the The Curlew Centre and whilst I find the spare batteries, I’m mulling over what we’re going to try and create.

Sound Spiral is an instrument for playing sound and music and the Transported team are spending 10 weeks listening to people’s thoughts on art and it’s place in their lives. We decided to use these consultation conversations as material for a new artwork within the Sound Spiral. It’s a new approach to working with people to make artwork. It’ll make people think about how they speak, what they say and whether these massed voices create something interesting when put together.

When you visit us, you’ll hear our piece as it develops – waves of voices, all giving their opinion and forming, if you like, a portrait gallery of voices. You can listen to a lone voice by walking to the speaker, or experience the massed voices as a whole by lying down or sitting in the Sound Spiral.

Anyway. Still got to find those spare batteries!

 

 

Welcome!

Welcome! This is a new blog about Gathering Grain, a new project by sound artist Rebecca Lee and the unique pop-up multi-channel sound system that is Sound Spiral. We have been commissioned by Transported, a community focused arts engagement programme for the people of Boston and South Holland.

Sound Spiral makes its first outing to Long Sutton in June

Over the course of two months, we’ll visit 6 different sites within South Holland and Boston, and on the way, create an archive of voices. The Sound Spiral will host the collection which will grow as we travel around. Our aim is to capture not just what people say, but the sound of their voices. This is sometimes called the grain of the voice and is something unique to each person. At each event, we’ll set ourselves up as a research station and make recordings, whilst also giving everyone the thrilling experience of being inside the Sound Spiral. It’s the first time we’ve worked together, and our aim eventually is to make a piece of sound art that will reflect the traveling we do and people we encounter in South Holland.

We will talk to people about what their voice means to them, what they like about it, how they use it and how they might not use it. The recordings will all be collected on line as an archive which anyone can listen to. They will then be used as part of a new sound composition for the Sound Spiral, which will also use other sound recordings gathered from the district  and contain within it the grain of many different voices from across Boston and South Holland. This will be completed by autumn 2013, and performed within the Sound Spiral at a number of public events.

 To find out more about Transported and Sound Spiral, or get in touch, go to the about page