Category Archives: 7 – MIXED MEDIA

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The LED at the End of the Tunnel

I’ve been a member of Gamelan Son of Lion, on and off, for 15 years. I explain it to my friends as my “poker night.” It feels that way. The members are all composer/performers who are known for their works in many different styles who unite once a week in their shared love of playing and performing on the gamelan, an orchestra of metallophones, tuned gongs and percussion indigenous to Java and Bali. One of the members that I’ve been playing with for the last couple of years, John Morton, has been getting good notice for what he does at his “day job,” creating sound installations. This time the locale of his work is a pedestrian tunnel in New York City’s Central Park. About as far from a gamelan as one could get, Morton used Cycling ’74’s Max/MSP software in the creation of this work.

The composer John Morton inside a tunnel, just north of the Central Park Zoo, that features a random collage of sounds he recorded all around the park.

The composer John Morton inside a tunnel, just north of the Central Park Zoo, that features a random collage of sounds he recorded all around the park. Photo credit: Michael Appleton for The New York Times

The official blurbage from the New York City Dept. of Parks & Recreation reads thusly:

“This summer, avant–garde composer John Morton’s sonic collage, Central Park Sound Tunnel, will be installed in one of Central Park’s iconic pedestrian tunnels between the Central Park Zoo and the Tisch Children’s Zoo at 65th Street. Beginning every half–hour with the ringing of the Delacorte chimes, this 20–minute, 6–speaker sound installation incorporates field recordings made in Central Park over the last year.

Using computer technology, a randomly generated selection of ambient sounds such as horses clopping, baseball games, birds, and chime tunes are woven together to form ever–changing compositions that echo through the cavernous tunnel.

John Morton’s Central Park Sound Tunnel enables visitors to experience the sonic landscape of the world’s most famous park,” said Parks & Recreation Commissioner Adrian Benepe. “This multi–faceted installation furthers our commitment to presenting innovative public art by leading contemporary artists and provides another exciting reason to visit Central Park this summer…”

MP3 sound examples on this page.

Recently, the New York Times published their own review of the piece and the artist.

John Morton, Central Park Sound Tunnel
June 8 to September 10, 2009
8:00 a.m. – 8:00 p.m.
North of the Zoo and Delacorte Clock

-Patrick Grant

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Wii Will, Wii Will Rock You

I can still remember my grade school self hunched low in the glow of the TV screen, muscles braced & straining, thumbs aching as I defended the world from space invaders and incoming asteroid attacks. Atari’s joystick controller was my small body’s extension into the video-game universe, while the rest of me remained slouched in the living room cushions. Although I graduated to a Sega Genesis, my brother’s first Nintendo, brief dalliances with Myst, and a few frustrating marathon sessions with Sony Playstations, I can’t say I ever did become a hardcore gamer. But I certainly knew the pain of controller induced carpal tunnel syndrome.

I took note of cool developments in gaming technology and culture as years went by. I admired the perseverance and ingenuity of both designers and players, but weren’t we all still stuck at a desk or in an easy chair, tethered to the console by a wire and a controller?

When the Wii game system with its wireless Wiimote was introduced, gamers finally got off the couch to physically interact with their favorite games. You didn’t just press a button to swing a digital golf club, you had assume the STANDING position, put the device in hand and ACTUALLY SWING YOUR ARM. The Wii remote uses an accelerometer that detects and measures speed of motion and infrared sensors to gauge the device’s position in space when you point it at the sensor bar on the console. Wii’s peripheral controllers allow players to use more than their thumbs to manipulate objects, shoot lasers, play sports, dance, do yoga or conduct an orchestra.

Although the Wii remote’s been hacked to perform non-gaming tasks, like controlling a robot lawn mower, I’ve been noticing how programmers and artists exploit the Wii’s motion control capabilities in their work. The Wii remote devices seem to be especially popular with those who use Ableton Live, Max/MSP/Jitter, Serato Live or similar programs for live audio and visual mixing.
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Dial “M” for…

MMiX. That’s “2009” in Roman numerals and the year in which I am pulling together my current interests in how music and media manifest in real time performance through a collaboration with Theaterlab NYC.

Early this year, Theaterlab co-director, Carlo Altomare (with Orietta Crispino) asked me to think up some kind of a concert series for their upcoming season. Our previous effort was an installment of my One-Two-Three-GO! new music series in 2006 and that went quite well.

Ever since, I’d used “MMiX” as a graphic as part of the annual New Year greeting that I send out to my mailing list every year, and I knew that I wanted to use it again somehow. This opportunity gave me the perfect place for it. Perfect in so many ways.

At that time, I had just come off creating three scores for theater, one in NYC, and two in Brazil (Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro) and giving workshops on the software to the public. My whole emphasis has been to create musical scores that would be interactive with the performers on a number of levels that were not possible when I began working in the theater. Those possibilities are the direct result of a number of software programs that have made new these new levels possible, performable, and highly portable since all the hardware that had been used in the past has now been distilled down into the confines of a laptop computer.

With that having been achieved, any number of controllers (keyboards, wands, motion sensors etc.) could now be interfaced with the computer so that all of the performing arts had access.

I have come to see this extra “m” in MMiX as representing the different branches of the performing arts that are now able to be blended and blurred: music, mise-en-scene (theater, film), movement (dance), monographs (words; spoken or sung), montage (visual arts), etc. etc. etc. I found so many “m” words I’ll only put the essential ones here, but it should be said that, the most important one may be, is “meatware,” the human element in a technological system.

The purpose of this new blog is to consolidate the content of our research through original content and the many findings that we come across the internet of like-minded artists working along similar lines. Guided by partner and co-producer Jocelyn Gonzales, “The MMiXdown” will also document our progress in pulling together all of the above elements into a cohesive series of presentations to the public in October to see where we’re at, to see how far we can go, when software, hardware, and meatware meet in the common goal of artistic expression.

–Patrick Grant